


Signpost

by MathiasHyde



Category: Tennis no Oujisama | Prince of Tennis
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-04-28
Updated: 2017-12-17
Packaged: 2018-03-26 04:13:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 34,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3836611
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MathiasHyde/pseuds/MathiasHyde
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A tale of Chinen Hiroshi and Higa Chuu.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Chinen chooses to go to Higa Chuu for junior high. There are other schools much closer to his house, but Higa Chuu has the best gardening club out of them.

It's an extra ten minutes away from his house than his old school was, in the opposite direction from his elementary school as well. He has to leave forty minutes earlier than that though, to walk his siblings to school first, double back and then head to school himself but Chinen still arrives at the opening ceremony with time to spare in the morning and still with two morning hair washings as normal.

He sits next to a Tanishi Kei during the ceremony, sorted by name. 

They introduce themselves briefly but then fall into silence for the rest of the wait. Chinen pulls at the skin between his fingers and stares at his hands.

Instead of listening to the welcoming speeches, he watches the boy pull apart a melon pan on his lap and, with covert glances around them, eat it during the ceremony. Chinen also notices how he's a few scant centimeters taller than Tanishi, both of them still half a head taller at least than the other surrounding first years.

He'd had to have his trousers custom ordered from the school and he wonders if Tanishi Kei had to have his ordered too.

Maybe not, since he is significantly wider than Chinen and maybe the extra length in his legs fit okay with the wider waist. Chinen's thinness had meant anything that fit there had been very short in the ankle.

Tanishi gets up first when the welcoming ceremony is over, tucking the empty wrapper of the melon pan into his pocket.

“See you 'round,” he says and Chinen raises his hand even as the other boy turns and stumps away with the crowd of other first years.

He wonders if this means they're friends now.

–

He signs up for the gardening club on the first day.

They have a small greenhouse at the back of the school for the senior students and the stretches of garden beds are also left to the club to look after. After a bit of debating, they assign Chinen a whole garden bed to himself to look after, along the side of the school near the fence and he spends some time looking at it after school.

It isn't a well looked after garden bed, with a few remnants of plants from a few years ago that had long been abandoned and had wilted. Chinen crouches down next to it to look properly and idly pulls out a few weeds that had taken over the garden bed.

It's good soil at least, he realises as he scrunches his fingers in the garden bed and lifts out a handful of dirt.

He plans to bring in some cuttings from home, maybe start a proper herb garden with the extra space that he didn't have in his mother's garden.

“You're seriously joining the tennis club, Eishirou? They're really weak.”

Chinen pauses at the sound of other voices and he looks over to see two students approaching. One of them has glasses that glint in the afternoon sun and the other had a hat on. He wonders how often it gets washed.

There are tennis courts right behind them, he realises for the first time as he looks at the other students. But the nets aren't up and they're deserted and his gaze lingers just a bit too long.

“Right now they're weak.” 

“But they won't be-- oops, my bad.” The hat wearing boy trips over Chinen's feet and stumbles.

Chinen turns and smiles at the boy, who takes an automatic step back. They’re first years too, he realises.

“I’m starting a garden here,” he says. “What should I plant?”

There’s a long silence broken only by the hat guy mumbling a “what?” before Glasses says something. “Goya. Let’s go, Kai-kun.”

Hat looks confused but hurries along to catch up to Glasses who walks off with a gait that makes Chinen pause and watch after them for a long time until they round the corner and disappear.

He hears a “Eishirou, you hate goya,” but Chinen pays it no mind as he turns back to his garden bed and contemplates it.

-

He’s out the back of his house, looking at their own herb garden when his mother comes home, hearing the sound of her engine turning off and the front door opening.

He’d gotten home late that day, making dinner for his siblings and grandfather and leaving his mother's portion on the counter, covered carefully with plastic wrap. It had felt strange this afternoon, not having to walk home with his younger siblings in tow – the oldest of his younger sisters was now in grade 5 and had taken responsibility for getting them all home safely instead.

His mother sits on the back porch and eats her dinner on her lap while he carefully collects cuttings from their garden.

“How was your first day at school, Hiroshi? Did you make any friends?”

“I met some people,” he says and he doesn't have to look at her to know that she'll be smiling at him. “The gardening club gave me a garden to look after in the school. “I'm going to plant these tomorrow.”

She gets up and ruffles his hair fondly. It's still damp from his shower earlier, but it'd been drying quickly in the warm night. His mother is short, even now he is starting to inch past the top of her head. And if the scattered photos around the house of his father are anything to go by, he is going to get a lot taller once puberty hits.

“They don't have a herb garden at your school? That won't do.”

“I can plant them there and bring them home too.”

“I'll drive you to the nursery if you can wait 'till the weekend, alright?” She ruffles his hair again. “Thanks for making dinner again. Don't stay up too late.”

–

Chinen has mixed feelings about his classes. He had to move seats within the first week after complaints from the students behind him that they couldn't see the board with him sitting in front of him. But he doesn't mind, since now he sits in the back corner and can look out the window and see the gardens and a hint of the ocean through the trees.

He likes science class the best, where they're learning about different states of matter and phase diagrams. He likes being able to light bunsen burners and explain in detail what is happening on a molecular level as ice melts and then turns to steam.

Their first class quiz he gets 100%.

Science is followed closely by English, which is taught by a foreigner with shiny blond hair and brightly painted nails. When they have English in the mornings, the sunlight reflects off her hair in way that makes Chinen stop paying attention to sentence structure and grammar.

He doesn't do as well in English as he does in Science and when they practice conversations in pairs, he still stumbles over words and his sentences need correcting, but so does his partner for that lesson, so it doesn't bother him.

He doesn't like physical education, where they're playing basketball at the moment. He feels awkward as he tries to dribble the ball and he usually ends up just standing near the hoop down one end to try and avoid playing.

His teammates always make him start in the center of the court and hit the ball the referee tosses up, and he usually wins, aided by his long limbs and extra height on the other students.

Tanishi Kei isn't in his physical education class, and the other boys just can't make up for the difference in height or reach.

At least, that's what he thought until he was beaten. He hadn't taken it seriously, the boy over a head shorter than him, one of the shortest boys in the year, surely. But he times his jump just perfectly, jumping higher than Chinen has ever seen anyone jump, it's almost like he's flying. And the boy laughs as he hits the ball first, past Chinen's face and immediately runs off as he lands.

Chinen stares at him in shock, turning around to watch him chase after the ball, shouting at his teammates and laughing all the same.

He doesn't see the boy again, his height and black hair lost in the rest of the class. At least until one of the last basketball lessons.

“Look out!”

Chinen turns around at the shout, only to get a ball in the face and he stumbles back, landing heavily. The class has gone silent and he can hear the sound of the ball bouncing away.

“Sorry, I thought you were paying attention!” There is a hand in his face and Chinen grabs it, letting the boy help him up.

It's only when he's standing that he looks down and sees the tanned face of the flying boy from lessons ago, looking at him with some concern. He's still very short.

“I'm fine.” He pulls his hand out of the boy's grip and sees him laugh before getting a light whack on the chest.

“It'll teach you to not doze off during class, anyway. You should save it for English or something.”

“Hirakoba-kun, that's not nice!” A teacher hurries forward and shoos him away before turning his attention to Chinen to make sure he's okay.

Chinen chooses to sit on the sidelines for the rest of the lesson and watch instead of playing. He watches Hirakoba, or at least tries to. Sometimes he vanishes when classmates block him from sight.

–

He plants the goya as they start to enter May, just one small plant at the edge of his garden bed. The sage is already starting to take off and he stands up as he waters the whole bed.

The tennis team is practicing today and he can hear the rhythmic 'thwack' of the ball across the court and the sounds of the tennis club running back and forth.

He only watches a little bit; letting his gaze linger when he comes back with a full watering can or when he turns around to get another new pot to plant in.

They... are kind of terrible. Even though Chinen has no knowledge of tennis beyond maybe seeing a few clips of matches on the television, he can see they're bad.

The coach does a lot of shouting, but otherwise just sits on a bench and watches the team maybe even less closely than Chinen does.

He sees Glasses and Hat among the small group of new first years, both who had joined on the second or third day of the year, but they don't do a lot of playing. For them, it's mostly picking up balls on the rare days that the club actually practices on the court.

He wonders briefly where they go otherwise or if they just practice that infrequently.

Sometimes at lunch he sees Glasses and Hat playing, hitting balls back and forth between them, playing over a net that wasn't put up, visible only to them. 

A little bit later, he notices another person has joined their lunchtime group, Hirakoba from physical education class.

During club practice, Hirakoba, or any of the other first years actually, doesn't play at all. He just collects balls and laughs at Hat when they're close by. He has other friends though in the tennis club, he always seems to be in the center of the groups of first years and Chinen wonders what it's like. To have friends like that.

So Chinen only sees them playing at lunchtime.

Glasses is easily the best of the three, maybe one of the best ones in the club entirely, he never lets any balls past him.

Hirakoba is a good player too, He's flashy when he practices and Chinen watches him jump up and smash a ball, almost too high that he'd thought he might miss it if he hadn't known better.

He really does look like he flies sometimes and Chinen spends quite a few lunch times staring at his back to see if there's wings there.

Hat isn't very good, holding the racquet awkwardly in his left hand with both Glasses and Hirakoba trying to help him until he finally gives up, kicking a tennis ball across so it hits the chainlink fence.

“This isn't working, Eishirou! This stupid racquet—”

“Maybe you should try holding it backwards, Kai, so it matches your backwards mind.”

Hirakoba laughs at his own words but Chinen doesn't see the humour. 

“What, Hirakoba?! Say that again!”

Glasses looks speculatively at Hat though – Kai, Chinen tells himself – his gaze focusing on his left hand that's still clutching at the tennis racquet.

Chinen goes back to his lunch.

The next time he sees them, days later, Kai is holding his racquet differently. Backwards, he realises.

His shots are still awkward, but they seem to be better than before from what Chinen can tell. Maybe he is more comfortable being backwards.

He can understand that.

–-

Chinen doesn't understand why the first years can't play during team practice beyond a few basic rallies and some racquet swings. The third and second years aren't as interesting to watch, he decides, even though they do a lot more playing and actually hitting the balls.

Instead he focuses on the first years, who are just hanging around, watching as well, huddled in groups to talk.

He's startled out of his quiet contemplation, his watering can long forgotten about in his hand, as he hears someone talk, louder than the usual hum of voices below the shouting from the actual courts.

“Hey Hirakoba, the creepy guy's staring at you again.”

Hirakoba interestingly turns red and for a moment, looks at him from across the court and through the fence.

“Idiot! He's just watching in general. Don't be stupid.”

He thinks that will be the end of it and turns around to go back to his garden, but there's footsteps approaching and they stop behind him.

“You know, you can always join the tennis club if you're interested. You're always watching us practice.”

Chinen tightens his grip on his watering can and he concentrates on the plants. “I'm not interested.”

There's a pause and Hirakoba laughs. Chinen wonders how close to the fence he is. “Does that mean you were watching _me_ , then? And not the tennis club?”

Chinen turns around and crosses the one, two step distance between the edge of his garden bed and the tennis court fence. He still towers over Hirakoba, who tilts his head back and grins up at him.

His eyes are blue, he notices and stares at him for a long moment before he says anything.

“You're so short, why would I even notice you?”

There's a flash of hurt on Hirakoba's face before it settles into a set jaw and an annoyed look. “Whatever. A twiggy person like you probably couldn't even play tennis.”

He huffs and then walks away and Chinen stares after him for a long time. But he doesn't look around at him again.

–

The group of first years doesn't practice every lunchtime, and those days without them to watch, Chinen sits on the edge of his garden bed, his long legs stretched in front of him.

Sometimes he reads, but sometimes he forgets his book at home and passes the lunch break staring at the short brick wall that then turns into chainlink fence surrounding the courts.

He used to eat in the classroom, but the chatter of his classmates in the room with him was too distracting, so Chinen moved outside. He doesn't think anyone's noticed yet even though it's been over two months already.

He idly pulls out a stray weed that's growing in between the cracks of the garden bed wall, dropping it and turning the page of his book.

Classes are still going well. He gets two more 100%'s in science, much to the surprise of his teachers. His english marks have picked up now that his mother is helping him a little on the weekends when she's free, looking over his shoulder at his desk and correcting his homework.

Physical education is still bad, they've started tennis now and he feels even more awkward than ever trying to hit the ball with a reach too long. He's aware too, of Hirakoba watching him sometimes, although whenever he glances over the other boy is always looking away and usually talking to someone else.

More often than not, Chinen opts to sit out, scuffing lines into the side of the court with his shoe and picking at the fluff on a stray ball that he's pocketed.

His teacher asks if he wants to join in, every time, but never presses the issue when he says no.

He's weeding again when he hears their coach berating the third years and he stands up to watch as the coach jabs one of them in the chest repeatedly.

“They lost at the prefecturals on the weekend,”

Chinen looks around, and then down to see Hirakoba standing nearby, on the other side of the fence of course.

It doesn't surprise him, when he thinks about it. None of the good players in the tennis club had been considered for the team, because they were never allowed to play during club time.

“You should join if you want. You're always here watching, I've seen you. Besides, Coach Saotome's probably going to retire the third years and the second and first years can start training properly for next year.”

Hirakoba sounds very pleased with the idea and Chinen risks a look down at him to see him grinning as he looks at the rest of the club. It's good that Hirakoba isn't looking at him.

He doesn't know if Hirakoba expects him to say anything in reply. The silence seems to imply that he does. Chinen doesn't know what to say and when he tries to say something, anything, the words feel thick and heavy and awkward on his tongue.

Chinen finally turns away, picking up his watering can that's still almost full.

“I wonder who's talking. I can't see anyone at all,” he says out loud and he walks away to go to the tap on the other side of the campus.

“Asshole,” he hears behind him and Chinen hunches his shoulders slightly as he walks just a bit faster.

–

Chinen falls into a routine for the rest of the semester. His morning routine is the same as ever, with two hair washings and it's easier now that his sister has decided he doesn't need to walk them to school at all, except for the one time she has a presentation on and wants his support.

He doesn't pay much attention in english class anymore, preferring to focus on his teacher's hair still. It's clipped up today and he stares at the loose hairs he can see on her neck instead of her explanation.

But when she calls on him in class, he still has the right answer. His mother's help is doing a lot of good.

He's found somewhere else to sit for lunch, behind the gym where there's another stray garden bed that he's slowly growing summer daisies in. He finds he misses the constant thwack of the ball sounds from his other lunch spot, but he tells himself that it's quieter here and it's better for reading.

Chinen never really focuses on _why_ he set out to find a new place to eat, just that he did. He also doesn't dwell on how he sometimes finds himself backing away from the tennis court garden bed when he approaches and can hear the sound of people already practicing there, but all too readily goes there when there's nothing but silence.

Later on he realises that even when he does go to the tennis courts and there's people there, it's when it's only third years playing, with the noticeable absence of the rest of the club and the shouting of their coach.

The semester trickles on, summer arrives and his birthday goes by without event.

“Did you want to invite anyone to celebrate it with?” his mother asks one night, a week before.

“No, nobody.”

No one knows of his birthday at school and he's never celebrated it with anyone outside of his family before, but that doesn't bother him.

His mother takes the afternoon off work and when he comes home, earlier than normal, the dining table is groaning under the weight of dishes and when he sneaks a look in the fridge, there's a large box from a cake shop in town.

Dinner is delicious and the cake is soft and sweet and his mother makes him blow out a small army of candles before any of them are allowed to eat it. His presents from his family are small but thoughtful and he places them carefully on his bookshelf and desk.

He knows his classmates celebrate birthdays together and with other friends. There's always talk of so-and-so's birthday coming up and how they're going to some place that Chinen's never heard of. He sees the exchange of presents in homeroom from his desk at the back where he doesn't block people's view of the whiteboard.

It doesn't bother him.

He bets that none of their mother's get them at-home chemistry testing kits with test tubes and pipettes and tweezers and packets of universal litmus paper. Chinen carefully removes one small strip of litmus paper and leaves his room for the bathroom. The bath should still be full, his grandfather hadn't bathed yet.

\--

The end of semester arrives faster than expected and with it the anticipation of a few weeks off from school.

He has no supplementary classes to take during the summer break, he passes all his classes easily with the exception of geography which he scrapes through.

It's after they've been dismissed that Chinen goes down to the garden in front of the tennis courts to check on his plants one last time before he leaves. He already saw the gym ones at lunch time and he feels like he's abandoned these ones a little.

“Hey! It's that guy again!”

Chinen freezes, halfway through tugging with a particularly stubborn weed. Even having somehow not seen them for weeks, he knew that voice. It was Hat – Kai, he reminded himself.

He decides spontaneously that his garden looks okay, even with the weeds that he can deal with when he comes back and stands up to leave before they can get any closer.

“Chinen-kun?”

He pauses and turns to see Hirakoba, his tennis bag slung over one shoulder and smiling. His hair's grown in the few weeks Chinen hasn't seen him. He thought it would be hard to avoid looking at him during physical education, but he'd found it easy enough, just letting Hirakoba fade into the rest of the classmates who had no individuality to him.

“I'm right, right? Your name's Chinen.” He seems to take Chinen's silence as assent and he took a few steps closer. “I'm Hirakoba Rin.”

“I know who you are.”

He hasn't gotten any taller, or maybe Chinen's grown more. His grin has grown though and he looks quite pleased at Chinen's words.

“This is Kai Yuujirou and Kite Eishirou. You've probably seen them around a bit.” Hirakoba points out the other two first years who are still standing and waiting. Kai looks like he wants to leave already and Kite looks... bored, almost. Chinen glances him for a little bit longer than is polite and Kite just raises an eyebrow.

“Are you going home now?” Hirakoba asks.

He can feel Hirakoba looking at him and then down at the garden bed which is still looking like a mess, no matter what he'd told himself earlier. He wonders if Hirakoba can tell, does he know anything about gardening?

“Yeah.” He pauses. “I have to pick up my siblings,” he adds on at the end uncomfortably.

“Ahh, I have so much work to do, I don't think I'll have any break at all.” Hirakoba sighs dramatically and grimaces at Chinen who gives him a confused smile back. The grimace turns into a genuine smile and Hirakoba reaches out to tap him on the arm with the back of his hand. “Have a nice break, then. See you next semester.”

Chinen awkward nods his head, first at Hirakoba who hurries back to Kai and Kite, and then to those two who are still watching him.

And then there isn't much else to do but give his garden one last look before he turns and walks away.

He doesn't know how to feel about the fact that he almost doesn't want to.


	2. Chapter 2

Chinen spends the first week of the summer holidays in the garden, the back of his neck and shoulders turning red in the first two days until he finds a sunhat and a bottle of sunscreen left very pointedly next to his gardening tools.

He suspects either his mother or one of his sisters: the plastic flowers on the brim give them away. But Chinen obliges and wears the sunhat anyway, even though the broad brim flops in his eyes, and the straw of the hat tickles his scalp.

The cold showers and aloe gel his mother hands him in the evening helps the sunburn he'd already gotten and in a few days his shoulders just look browner than ever.

With the pressure of end of semester tests and gardens at school to look after, Chinen hasn't been able to spend as much time looking after the garden at home as much as he'd like and it shows. He knows his grandfather occasionally putters around and does what he can, but Chinen can see overgrowth and areas that need a lot of attention, particularly in the back of the garden beds where his grandfather can't reach as easily.

He digs out weeds and trims back some plants, talking to his grandfather about what he'd like to grow next.

Chinen knows he should be doing his summer assignments, but there's still plenty of time, so he plays cards with his grandfather sometimes at night, sitting on the porch when there's a nice breeze, the porch light flickering occasionally. On the more humid nights, they play at the kitchen table, his mother crying foul when Chinen again places down three aces, demanding a rematch even though she has to get up early the next day for work.

He sleeps in and runs around after his siblings during the day, sometimes all four of them squashing into the living room with his complaining grandfather to watch television. He still has dinner duty, but his younger sister Arisa helps with carefully chopping up the vegetables and his grandfather sometimes kicks him out of the kitchen to cook for them instead.

Chinen really likes the summer holidays.

They've been talking about going on a holiday as a family for the past few summers but they haven't gotten around to it yet. For the past few months his mother has been talking about going to the mainland for a couple of weeks as a family, maybe taking his siblings to Tokyo Disneyland that they've been talking about for ages.

He can almost believe they are actually going when he finds his mother looking at flights one night on her computer that she quickly quits out of and hides the page guiltily as he sneaks up behind her to wish her goodnight.

But it seems this year is no different to the others with his mother being pulled away to an important conference for work and unable to take time off at the last minute.

Chinen tries to not let his disappointment show as she mentions it at dinner one weekend, one of the few times that they have a family dinner in the week. But she finds him later that night, picking at the grass on their lawn under torchlight, making a small mountain out of it.

“I'm sorry Hiroshi,” she says and envelops him in a hug. “Next year we'll definitely go.”

He wonders if she's comforted his siblings in just the same way. They had been more upset about it at dinner than he had. Chinen pulls at the grass some more, cutting through one of the blades with his blunt thumb nail.

Normally he'd push her off from him. He can smell the fresh shampoo smell of the newly bathed and it's a bit too hot and sticky even in the darkness for hugging. He also hasn't taken his bath for the night. But his mother doesn't seem to mind.

“You're always working,” he says quietly, placing the newest piece of grass onto the pile next to him.

He knows he shouldn't complain and he doesn't mind, most of the time, really. He was used to it and it seemed normal now to cook dinner and have his mother return late at night sometimes and leave in the mornings. But sometimes...

“I know, I'm sorry.”

But her apology doesn't change anything and he listens to her instructions as she stocks the fridge with food and makes sure he has everything. He wonders if it's more or less convenient that it's happening now when they're all on holiday and at home.

His mother goes away for two weeks for the conference, but she leaves her car at home so Chinen's grandfather can still make use of it if he needs to. She also slips Chinen a few thousand yen notes before she leaves with a secretive smile. 

“Buy some nice plants to surprise me with when I get back home, alright?” she says and ruffles his hair fondly. “I'll call everyday.” 

Chinen tucks the notes carefully in an envelope and puts it on his desk, propped up by his pencil case.

He asks his grandfather about going to the nursery that evening as the old man takes advantage of the empty garden and a cooling nighttime breeze to move his body slowly through some stances. Chinen feels a little guilty seeing this; starting junior high and focusing so much on gardening means he hasn't had as much time to practice martial arts with his grandfather as he used to.

They get along well without the morning practice together, but it still makes him feel guilty. His younger siblings didn't have the interest in it that he'd had and while they'd learned the basics – his sisters most importantly of all – they hadn't continued. He endeavours to get back into training as soon as possible.

“We'll have to take your siblings too,” his grandfather says gruffly, but he agrees to take Chinen to the nursery the next day.

–

His siblings are less help than anything in the nursery. They all love plants to an extent, even though his siblings don't have as much of a green thumb as he and his mother do.

Instead they like rummaging in the scraggly strawberry plant they have around the side that Chinen can't seem to get to grow properly no matter what, picking the tiny strawberries the moment they're ripe. His youngest sister Sana refuses to eat them although she loves to find the strawberries, but the elder two were happy to fight over who got to eat them.

They all enjoy spending hot summer afternoons near the impatiens, finding the best bulbs of seeds to pop and competing with each other. Chinen knows the best bulbs were found at the back of the bushes at the very back of the garden and maybe one day he'll share that secret.

Chinen frowns over the different bags of fertiliser while his grandfather supervises his siblings who are looking at all the different seedlings. He wants to try germinating his own seedlings; perhaps his senpai at school will let him have a small spot in the greenhouse to put a few seed containers.

Sana wants more strawberries and she points at the leafy seedlings with brightly coloured pictures stuck on the card as he comes over.

Arisa wants some of the cat-related plants; cat-mint, cat-nip and cat-grass. She's been obsessed with the neighbour's cat that's been spotted sunning in their garden lately, siting on the porch and staring at it while Chinen tries to not disturb it as he gardens.

Hiroki alternates between looking at the herbs and the purple violas that are blossoming. When Chinen comes up behind him to look at the violas too, he stumbles over his words and pretends like he wasn't looking at them at all. Chinen carefully picks out a nice selection of purple violas seedlings and puts them in his trolley for his younger brother as Hiroki now looks at runner beans.

He tries to carefully calculate the cost of everything before they head to the counter, the envelope of money from his mother carefully stashed in his pocket. But even with his careful preparation, when they go to the counter, they're still more than a thousand yen over budget.

Chinen pulled at the skin between his fingers and chews the inside of his lip as he tries to think what seedlings he could put back. Perhaps he could come back another day and get some more fertiliser, he still has some left from last trip. He's surprised out of his thoughts as his grandfather pats him on the upper arm and shuffles forward, pulling out an old pouch from his pocket.

They stand there for ten minutes while his grandfather carefully counts out the extra cost from their total on the counter, mostly in fifty, ten and five yen coins.

He's smiling as they leave the nursery, uncaring of how strangers moved out of his way as he walked. He carries the bag of fertiliser easily enough on one shoulder, his grandfather having taken over control of the trolley with a smile all too similar to Chinen's own.

–

One Wednesday sees Arisa invited to a play day at one of her friend's houses and Chinen walks her there. His mother's coming home the next day and it's his sister's birthday just a few short days after that. Normally by now he'd be discussing with his mother what to get her in terms of presents, but even though she calls every night to check they're alright, it's hard to have a secretive conversation when all three of his siblings are crowding around trying to get a word in to the conversation.

He's happy to spend his day wandering around the neighbourhood. There is a bookstore not too far away and he wiles away the hours there, flicking through the new novels and venturing into the English section to sound out the titles of the books and occasionally trying to read some of the pages.

He leaves the bookshop eventually and heads into smaller stores to try and maybe get some ideas for Arisa. Nothing stands out to him though and the shop people asking if he needs any help usually is enough to make him shake his head and awkwardly shuffle out of the store again before he can get a good look.

It's late afternoon and nearly time to pick his sister up as he walks along the beach. He scrunches the sand between his toes and dodges to the side as someone runs past him, laughing, the spray of sand hitting his legs. Someone else follows behind a few moments after and Chinen rubs his foot on the sand to make it squeak.

There are people running along the beach further down as well, Chinen realises and he stands and watches them for a few moments, hearing someone shouting as they race back and forth. Training for something, he thinks. He wonders how long they've been there, they look very tired.

He's turning around to leave when he hears someone call behind him, “Oi, Chinen-kun!”

He stops, hunching his shoulders a bit at the sudden attention and then he realises someone's hurrying towards him, breaking away from the training group. It's Hirakoba, he realises as they get closer and Chinen stares down at him in surprise. He doesn't know what to do now.

“Wow, I didn't think you'd be here!” Hirakoba says. He sounds out of breath and he pants a bit as he stands still in front of Chinen, one hand on his chest. “How are you?”

Chinen's fingers tighten on the straps of his shoes and his toes curl in the sand. “I'm okay.” He fumbles for words to say and is caught in Hirakoba's expectant smile. “... Better than you.”

He looks more tanned than he had a few weeks ago and Chinen can see a smear of sand on his face. His hands from what he can see when Hirakoba waves them around, also have some on them. Maybe he'd fallen down while running.

Hirakoba laughs and shrugs, looking over at the group of people. “I'm exhausted. The club's been training here this whole week. I almost want to do assignments instead.”

He nods, although he isn't sure he agrees with Hirakoba's desire to do his summer assignments. Chinen fidgets, turning over the hem of his shirt once and then twice and then unrolling it, staring at the smudge of sand.

“Are you having a good holiday? Been keeping busy?”

“I've been gardening...”

“Oh yeah, that's right. I heard you planted goya at the school, is it true? Eishirou was talking about it the other day.” Hirakoba looks horrified at the idea and shudders theatrically.

Before Chinen can answer though, he hears the coach from before shouting across the beach. “Hirakoba, get back here! Ten extra laps for slacking off!” 

Hirakoba looks just a little guilty but he smiles at Chinen anyway, shrugging. “Oops, the baldy coach caught me, I have to go. Have a nice summer, Chinen-kun, see you at school.”

“Ah, wait.” He reaches out and grabs Hirakoba by the upper arm before he can leave and Hirakoba turns to look at him, his eyes wide.

The words die in his mouth though and Chinen's grip tightens on Hirakoba's arm until he winces. Suddenly he can't remember what he wanted to ask in the first place, so he blurts out the first thing to come to mind. “What would you get a girl for her birthday?”

That seems to have caught Hirakoba even more off guard and he frowns. “A girl?” It's not a bad question to ask, Chinen realises and he stares intently at Hirakoba as he tries to think of an answer. “I don't know... some cute hair ties? A nice hair clip?”

Chinen nods thoughtfully and lets go. Hirakoba gives him one last smile and runs off to join the rest of the tennis club in their training.

–

The rest of the summer holidays pass quickly. His mother returns safely from her trip, bringing with her gifts. Chinen uses the new professional-standard Japanese-English dictionary to help finish off the last of his English homework and flicks through the pages at night under the torchlight as he lies in bed.

The spine had been broken when his mother had given it to him and there were tabs that she'd put in there, during the course of her trip. But Chinen doesn't mind. He likes to open it to the pages and try to think about what sort of scenario she would have needed the marked page for.

As he should have expected, his mother has the birthday situation under control, having taken an afternoon off while she was away to go shopping. But they still go on the weekend to look for some cute hair ties and Chinen picks over the containers with Sana for what seems like forever and they end up with far too many pairs of hair ties with plastic strawberries attached.

But Arisa is happy anyway when she opens the little paper bag to many little hair ties and she makes Chinen put them in her hair. He combs her hair back into twintails, securing first one side and then the other, taking care that the two strawberries on each tie are facing the top.

And all too soon, summer is over and things fall back into their usual routine as Chinen returns to school for the second semester. There are few changes this semester, much easier than the start of the year. He washes his hair twice in the morning, leaving himself plenty of time to do his sister’s hair, today carefully plaiting her shiny hair into twin braids, wrapping her favourite ties around the ends.

Chinen likes the black cat that sits on the wall of one of the houses on his way to school. He always stops to pat it, sometimes having to shoo it back to its house as he leaves and it tries to follow to keep winding around his legs. He hasn’t seen it all holidays and the greeting this morning is particularly enthusiastic as it kneads at his calves and he has to pick it up to put it back on the wall.

Chinen doesn’t like the dog that he always passes on the way to school. The lady likes to walk him at the same time in the mornings and they always cross paths. Today they’re on the left side of the road and Chinen crosses quickly to the other side to avoid her. He averts his eyes as she calls out a morning greeting to him as she always does, her fluffy dog’s tail wagging at him. He raises a hand at her, but by the time he actually looks up, she’s already walking down the street again.

His seat at the back of the classroom near the window hasn’t changed, although the girl in front of him is different. Chinen stares at the small white hairs he can see mixed in with her black hair and he resists the urge to pluck them, clenching his fingers in his lap as their homeroom teacher talks.

He spends homeroom instead staring out the window at the gardens. The frangipani tree outside was looking a little flower bare and Chinen considers telling his club senpai to change the fertiliser. He wonders what his two small garden beds look like after summer break. He probably should have tended to the one near the tennis courts better before leaving… Chinen frowns as he tries to remember why he didn’t.

They’ve moved onto earth science at the start of this semester and their teacher tealks them through volcanoes and fault lines, brightly coloured diagrams on the projector. Chinen scribbles down notes, almost double what everyone else is writing. His desk mates all seem to still be in holiday mode, their pens still.

He still frowns over maths a little, moving his fingers as he scribbles down the simple algebraic equations, his x’s turning into loops as the lesson continues on. Geography is still hard though, and he writes on his hand to practice it more at home. He’d spent too long on English.

But really nothing has changed in the holidays and it’s kind of nice.

He decides to spend lunch time by the gym garden, pulling out weeds and looking over the garden bed to think about what to plant next. He doesn’t touch his lunch much that session, instead pulling at stubborn weeds who have taken advantage of the holidays to set their roots down deep.

This means that he goes to the tennis courts after school, hearing the familiar voices and the light ‘pong’ of tennis balls on the racquets. It’s there that the first big change of the semester presents itself.

“Chinen-kun!”

It’s strange to be greeted enthusiastically when he arrives and Chinen tightens his hand around the shovel as Hirakoba comes out from the tennis courts after calling his name. He awkwardly bobs his head at Hirakoba in greeting, putting his things down in the gardening bed before turning to face him, his fingers already twisting at the material of his shirt.

He’s still just as short as before and Chinen frowns as Hirakoba waits almost expectantly in front of him, the silence drawing out longer.

“You’re dressed differently,” he says finally and the shorter boy preens a little at his words, the smile appearing again and Chinen relaxes a little, knowing that he’d said the right thing.

The PE uniform from before was gone, now replaced with a purple shirt that hung awkwardly on him, too big around the waist and too loose in the sleeves. Chinen wonders if it was the smallest size, because he can see Kai just a few paces away with much the same ill fitting shirt.

He’s seen the same style shirt before, on the third years that seemed to have spent most of the time on the court last semester. They’re gone now, he realises as he looks out at the court and scans the faces and it’s a different group of people standing out in the different coloured uniforms.

He vaguely remembers Hirakoba saying something about people retiring last semester… he supposed that was it, then.

“I passed the regular selection over the summer,” Hirakoba says and Chinen nods automatically, glancing back at him. His grin has widened and he looks all too pleased with himself. “Well, me, Kai and Eishirou did.”

Chinen looks over in the direction of where Hirakoba is waving, spotting Kai again with his familiar hat and Kite, who is staring all too intently in their direction. He stares right back at Kite for a long while before the other boy raises an eyebrow and Chinen looks away.

There’s silence now, as he tries to think about what to say. He fidgets instead as the silence draws out longer. Hirakoba’s waiting for him to say something again, that much he can tell. This time takes longer than before though and there’s a silently impatient expression that’s replaced the previously smug one now.

“Ah… your present suggestion was really good,” he says finally. “My sister really liked the hair ties.”

That seems to take Hirakoba by surprise and he nods vaguely, looking a little confused for a moment. “Oh. No worries, I’m glad I could help.”

Hirakoba looks a little relieved as the coach calls his name and he apologises as he turns to leave. Chinen fumbles with words for a bit longer as he watches Hirakoba slip through the gate and pick up the racquet resting on the side. He spins it in his hand and for a moment, Chinen is mesmerised by the movement, the words almost slipping from his mind.

“Good job on… passing,” he blurts out and he swears that he can see Hirakoba grinning even as he’s surely out of earshot by now, already hanging off Kai’s shoulders, pressing their heads together, the red and white hat knocked askew.

Hirakoba laughs and knocks it off fully and Kai grumbles as he has to pull away to pick it up.

He should practice saying the words, he decides, so next time he can say it easier and so Hirakoba can hear it properly.

Chinen mouths the sentence as he turns around to look at his garden bed. It’s a mess as expected and Chinen kneels down to start pulling out the weeds. The rhythmic sounds of the balls on the racquet is almost soothing as he finds himself unconsciously timing his gardening to the sounds.

If that’s the only change to school this semester, it’s not a bad one, Chinen decides and he pauses partway through the afternoon club time to sit on the edge of the garden bed and watch the tennis club. It’s more lively now, with better matches and he only looks away and goes back to his gardening when he notices Kite staring at him again.

–

“Good job on passing,” Chinen repeats again, talking to the inside of his shoe locker the next morning as he changes his shoes for indoor shoes.

It’s easier now to say, after having repeated it through the evening. His grandfather had given him advice too, whacking him in the back to make him stand up straighter to get air into his diaphragm. Chinen closes the door and heads to his classroom.

He wasn’t expecting a chance to say it before the afternoon, but he spots Kai coming down the hallway. This would be an excellent chance to practice it – and surely Kai… should be congratulated as well? 

Chinen puts a hand out in front of Kai to make him stop and Kai stares up at him in confusion. There’s a long drawn out silence between them and Chinen stares down at the other boy, the words heavy on his tongue and he takes a few deep breaths to try and make the words come out.

“Hat-kun,” he says and Kai jumps a little in surprise. “Good job on passing.”

The words come out awkwardly, still too stiff and not like how they had sounded as he’d said them in the bath tub, but Chinen is pleased enough. Kai stares at him and Chinen stares back, trying to read his expression. It looks scared almost, very confused as well… maybe that’s how he shows his happiness at being complimented?

Chinen nods at him and lets his hand drop back to his side before he starts walking towards his classroom, just as the bell rings.


	3. Chapter 3

They change PE classes this semester, combining with a different class. Chinen deflates a little as he finds this out, seeing new faces as they go to get changed. He had been preparing himself to talk to Hirakoba and congratulating him. It would have to wait until that afternoon, if the tennis club were practicing at the courts today.

Chinen never likes changing in front of his classmates, standing in the corner awkwardly, showing his back to the others as he quickly pulls off his shirt and pulls on the regulation PE one. There’s no laughter from him like there is from others in the room and Chinen goes through much the same rushed movements to change his shorts. He knows he’s skinny, there have always been the comments from his classmates in elementary school and their family doctor. But it’s gotten worse now that he’s had what is likely to be the first of a few growth spurts.

His fingers fumble with the laces of his shoes and he hurries out of the change room, hunching his shoulders as he leaves.

They’re playing dodgeball today, a nice easy lesson with their usual PE teacher away for the day and one of the senior maths teachers taking the class instead. The other PE teacher that takes the other class is in charge, setting up the balls in the middle of the room. Chinen plucks at the skin between his fingers and stares at the team on the other side of the gym.

He stands back as the whistle is blown and watches everyone scramble for the balls in the middle of the gym. He’s not good at dodgeball, too lanky and awkward to move quickly out of the way of incoming balls and his limbs don’t quite move the way he wants them to all the time. 

There’s the usual shrieking and it takes all of a few minutes to be hit by a ball, a glancing blow on his hip and his teacher blows his whistle and makes him sit on the side.

Chinen folds himself into a space on the floor and only from this position does he look at his teammates and spots someone he didn’t know how he’d missed earlier in the lesson.

Tanishi Kei, who still stands a head taller than the other boys in their class.

He watches the boy dodge out of the way of incoming balls with a strange nimbleness as he laughs and calls out taunts to the other side. And then picks up a ball and throws it. Chinen watches as the ball perfectly beams a boy on the other team in the face and he hits the ground hard. A strange hiccuping laugh escapes Chinen before he can press his lips tightly together to stop himself.

Tanishi catches his eye and grins and it’s hard to stop himself from smiling back at him. At least until the shrill sound of the teacher’s whistle cuts through the stunned silence.

“Tanishi-kun! Go sit on the side!”

The teacher is fussing around the fallen student, who groans as he’s brought carefully up to sitting and Tanishi laughs to himself as he sits down heavily next to Chinen. He takes up a lot of room, but Chinen doesn’t mind at all. There’s always a lot of space around him anyway.

“Chinen, right?”

He stares at Tanishi in surprise for a long while before he nods. Tanishi doesn’t ask if Chinen knows his name, maybe because the teacher had just been shouting it, or maybe because Tanishi knows that Chinen has memorised it from the opening ceremony when they’d sat next to each other.

He’d repeated it to himself regularly in the days following, in case they ran into each other again. Tanishi Kei. Tanishi Kei. Tanishi Kei. It was a hard name to forget once he’d done that and the boy was hard to miss too.

He tries to think of something to say and fidgets. His laces are starting to fray at the end and he pulls at it a bit.

“I forgot about the rule of hitting below the waist,” Tanishi grumbles eventually and Chinen looks at him again.

The boy would’ve fallen anyway, he’d seen the poor stance and the strength of Tanishi’s throws. It would have been easy enough to take out his legs. “You might have broken his kneecap instead,” he says and Chinen finds himself laughing a little at his own joke.

There’s a pause and then Tanishi’s laughing quietly too, a low rumbling chuckle and the boy sits back more.

Chinen twists the loose fabric of his shorts around his fingers as he tries to think of what to say next. He mouths a few questions to himself but when he tries to say one, the words get caught up around his tongue and he makes himself take a few deep breaths and stares at the resuming game of dodgeball.

The silence is pretty comfortable though, once he stops thinking too hard about something to say and lets himself relax just a little bit. It’s easier to relax around Tanishi than around his other classmates, he realises but no matter how much he frowns over it, he can’t figure out why. 

Tanishi isn’t called back into the game for the rest of the lesson and Chinen doesn’t move to get up either, even when a new game starts. The teacher doesn’t say anything either, which is nice.

When the lesson ends and they all move to get changed, Tanishi pushes himself up off the floor. “See you next lesson,” he says before he stumps off to join the push into the changing rooms. 

Chinen lifts his hand and waves at Tanishi’s back but the other boy has already shoved past everyone and disappeared.

–

“You join a club yet?” Tanishi asks and Chinen glances at him, the other boy watching the class. They’re moving onto volleyball now and again the teacher doesn’t say anything as the two of them choose to sit on the sidelines for the whole lesson.

Chinen doesn’t mind. He’s played volleyball before and always been faced with unhappy opponents as he lifts his arms up above his head and already reaches higher than the net to block things too easily. He imagines Tanishi has had the same experience.

He’s seen the class teachers watching the two of them closely this lesson, talking to each other behind their hands. They always stop whenever Chinen stares at them though and the back of his neck itches a little as though he can feel their whispers.

“I’ve joined the gardening club...” Chinen says and Tanishi grunts a bit.

“Sounds boring.”

Chinen frowns and his fingers clench into fists. “It’s not,” he says and the words come much more easily than before, not getting caught up around his tongue that feels sometimes as awkward as his limbs do. “I have two garden beds and I’m planting runner beans and herbs in one.”

And the tennis court ones had the added bonus of the club being interesting to watch while he sat under the sun.

But before he can add that part on, Tanishi was laughing and pounded him hard on the back and Chinen almost pitches forward at the first blow. It hurts, the hit harder than when his grandfather would whack his back to change his stance.

He can hear the panicked “Tanishi-kun--!” from the teachers but Chinen doesn’t pay it any mind as he punches Tanishi back, the angle awkward to get a proper blow in and he’s surprised as Tanishi blocks it with an all too familiar movement.

Chinen pulls back and Tanishi’s looking at him a little strangely. He shakes his head as the teacher comes over to make sure he’s okay and they pull away, leaving the two of them sitting together again in silence.

“Can I see your garden bed?” Tanishi asks and Chinen stares at him and after a few long moments, he becomes aware that his jaw has fallen open a bit and he snaps it shut.

“Why?” is the first question Chinen can think to blurt out and he cringes a little inside at how suspicious it sounds. “You said it was boring...” he adds on belatedly, as sort of an explanation.

Tanishi shrugs. “It could be fun.”

Chinen doesn’t know what to think about that. No one really comments on his garden; even the senpai from the club don’t ask about its progress and they still don’t seem to know that he’s taken over the abandoned one behind the gym, even though he told them the week he found it.

He doesn’t mind though, it’s nice to be able to separate his plants between the two.

He’s sure people see the one near the tennis courts, or at least the tennis people do… who else went around the side of the tennis club house?

“You won’t understand any of it,” he says and he can see Tanishi’s mouth opening to reply, a scrunching of his brow and Chinen hunches defensively, immediately standing up and leaving the gym to go to the changing rooms.

–

Eating alone doesn’t bother him and Chinen enjoys the fresh breeze today that carries a bit of the scent of the ocean on it as he stretches his legs out and sits on the edge of the gardening bed. His lunch today was made by his grandfather, with the bento filled with rice, some pickles and a slab of grilled fish. Chinen pokes at it with his chopsticks.

He’s just starting to break the fish into pieces when he hears footsteps approaching and looks up, to see the usual group of first years going into the tennis courts. Chinen stares at them as they look at him, waiting until they look away from him.

Glasses always stares the longest, even as he walks backwards into the courts and Chinen is distracted from it by Hirakoba waving a hand in front of his face and grinning at him.

“Oh, grilled fish. That looks yum,” Hirakoba says, looking down at his lunch and Chinen nods, clutching the box a little closer to himself unconsciously. “I’m jealous, mine was much less interesting.”

He isn’t sure if Hirakoba is just joking, but Chinen nods anyway.

Thinking of things to say to Hirakoba is hard and Chinen opens his mouth to talk… and then closes it again, staring down at his rice, frowning.

“We’re going up to Naha on the weekend to play in a small local tournament,” Hirakoba says suddenly. He bounces a little as he talks and Chinen watches his feet. “We’re all playing singles and the fatty coach has me in doubles as well.”

Chinen still doesn’t know much about tennis but he nods to that as well. Hirakoba seems excited anyway, so it has to be a good thing.

“You could come, you know. You’re always watching us practice and watching proper games is very different. You might really like it.”

It’s then that Chinen realises that this is the first time he’s really seen Hirakoba since the first day of term, with the tennis club seeming to be away for all afternoon sessions since then. And Chinen looks up at him suddenly and Hirakoba takes a step back in surprise.

“… Congratulations on passing,” Chinen blurts out and Hirakoba stares at him in confusion for a long awkward moment.

“What…? … Thank you?” Hirakoba says finally and his face relaxes into a smile.

Chinen smiles a little bit too, automatically. The silence is back again though as Chinen tries to think of what to say next. He mouths a question – what is doubles? - but he cuts off halfway through the sentence as he hears heavy footsteps and his name.

“This is where you were, Chinen.”

It’s Tanishi, Chinen realises and he surely must look comically surprised, seeing Tanishi appearing around the corner.

Glancing back at Hirakoba, he sees the other boy’s smile fade. “Oh, is this your friend, Chinen-kun?” Even his voice seems a little strained as Hirakoba looks at Tanishi.

Chinen doesn’t know how to respond to that, glancing at Tanishi and then back to Hirakoba.

“This is Hirakoba,” he says, gesturing. His hand drops though as he sees Tanishi’s expression turn just as quickly sour as Hirakoba’s had.

“Yeah, I remember him. We went to the same elementary school.” Tanishi looms over, nearly head and shoulders taller than Hirakoba. He laughs, so different the ones he’d given Chinen before hitting him on the back. “He looks even more shrimpy than he did back then.”

Chinen can see the shift in emotions on Hirakoba’s face, from shock to a strange twisting of his lip and somehow looking down his nose at Tanishi even as he stares up at the other boy. Chinen decides that he doesn’t like that expression at all, so different to what he normally saw.

“Well, I suppose if you eat that much, some of it has to go to growing taller,” Hirakoba says and he makes a pointed look at Tanishi’s lunch box and then up and down his form, still with his lip twisting.

Before Chinen can say anything, Tanishi takes an aggressive step towards Hirakoba and grabs onto his arm.

Hirakoba laughs at him and makes no move to get free. “Try it, fatty Tanishi.”

Tanishi just makes an angry noise and shoves Hirakoba back, who catches himself easily enough, turning a stumble into a few neat steps intead.

“You’ll probably just tell your family, crybaby.”

Hirakoba seems to visibly puff up at that and pointedly brushes off the sleeve of his sports jacket where Tanishi had grabbed him. “You’re not worth doing something like that.”

His smile seems a little forced as he faces Chinen, but at least it’s back. “See you, Chinen-kun. I’ll leave you two alone.” Hirakoba pulls one last face at Tanishi before he turns away and heads into the tennis courts.

He doesn’t know how to feel as he watches Hirakoba head towards his friends and it’s only then that Chinen realises that he’s clutching his lunch box tightly. Glasses is trying to push up Hirakoba’s sleeve and Hirakoba pushes his hand away impatiently, shaking his head and glancing back at where Chinen is sitting.

He’s distracted from his thoughts as he hears Tanishi sigh and sit down heavily next to him and hears the click of his lunch box being opened.

It _is_ a sizable lunch, but it’s all beautifully put together and Chinen goes back to prodding at his fish. The under side of it is a little soggy from the rice.

“Sorry,” he mumbles at Tanishi.

“What?”

“For Hirakoba thinking you’re my friend...” He hadn’t known how to respond to that… still didn’t, as he thought about it more now.

Tanishi snorts in laughter and elbows him. “I hate that boy.” There’s a long pause and Chinen starts eating, enjoying the taste of the pickles. “Is that all you’re having for lunch?” Tanishi asks him and Chinen nods around a mouthful of rice.

When he looks down to get the next bit of fish though, Tanishi is putting an egg roll on top of his rice, looking fluffy and perfect, much better than he can make himself. The egg roll is followed by a succulent piece of pork still dripping in soy sauce and Chinen hesitates before he passes over a couple of the pickles from his own lunch.

It’s an inadequate swap, but Tanishi still makes a pleased sound as he eats the pickles and Chinen smiles a little.

They don’t talk much during lunch, Chinen watching the tennis practice and hearing the laughter and taunting and his shoulders hunch a little more. At least until Tanishi nudges him each time and Chinen makes himself relax.

“Where’s your other garden?” Tanishi asks as they finish up and hear the end of lunch bell ring. 

Chinen frowns and looks down at his garden bed. It’s a little straggly and some of his plants aren’t growing as well as he’d like… but it’s still better than some of the other gardens around the school, cared for by his senpai.

“Near the gym. That ones just herbs though, it’s not as colourful.”

Tanishi glances down at his garden, looking almost confused. “Let’s eat lunch there tomorrow. It sounds better than here.”

–

Chinen is enjoying the humid night air outside when his mother comes home. It had just rained and the air smells damp and fresh on the wind. Arisa had been making daisy chains on the porch earlier in the afternoon and Chinen is plucking at the split stems left over.

The porch light flicks on as she comes and joins him, her bowl of dinner in hand to put on her lap as she sits down next to him and Chinen shuffles across a bit to make some room.

“You look happy today, Hiroshi,” she says, reaching up to fondly ruffle his hair. “Did you have a good day at school?”

Chinen nods and his fingers move a little faster as he ties the broken stem into a knot. “I used the dictionary in English class.” His teacher had been very impressed when she’d seen it and words had died in his mouth again as some of her blonde hair had fallen in front of her face as she’d been asking him about it.

His mother smiles at him and tucks into her dinner. Chinen had been a bit more liberal with the soy sauce tonight, the lingering taste of the pork from lunch inspiring him.

“I heard from your home room teacher that you’ve made a friend.”

Chinen stares in confusion at her as he tries to think. A friend…? The only people who he can even possibly start considering are Tanishi and… maybe Hirakoba, but the names falter as he stares at his mother some more.

“I don’t know if they’re friends,” he mutters, looking down at his knees and his mother’s smile fades a little.

He’s developing a bruise on his left knee and he can’t think how it got there. He prods at it and feels the dull pain. Perhaps from kneeling so much as he gardened…

“They…?” his mother repeats faintly before she speaks clearly. “You’ll figure it out,” she pats him on the shoulder before going back to her dinner. “You’ve got someone in mind at least.”

Chinen nods and prods at his bruise again. Maybe he should ask Tanishi about it. The other boy didn’t seem to be too bothered by questions, maybe he’d be willing to answer this one.

–

Chinen stops after school to inspect the vegetables at the shops near school. His mother had asked him to bring home some ingredients for stew and he ponders over the broccoli, wondering if it’s better than the ones near home. They’ve been a little yellow lately and he turns one bunch over to inspect the bottom.

“Chinen-kun,” someone says behind him and Chinen jumps, guiltily putting the broccoli back down, his shoulders hunching a little as he turns to look.

It’s Glasses, who he hasn’t seen up close since the start of the year. His staring seems just as intense from here as it does from across the tennis courts, that Chinen always looks away from.

Maybe Kite has just perfected the angle, but as he moves his head, his glasses flash and obscure his eyes for just a moment and Chinen leans down a little more to inspect closer.

“You’ve stopped eating near the tennis courts,” he says and Chinen blinks in surprise. It’s only been a few days since he’s started eating lunch with Tanishi, both of them sitting on the edge of the garden bed behind the gym and enjoying the quiet solitude. Sometimes they scare other first years that come around the corner, intimidated by the two of them’s combined heights and Tanishi’s booming voice.

Chinen fidgets a little and he makes himself breathe deeply before he replies. Kite just stares at him with the same unwavering intensity as he waits. “Some of the plants will die if I don’t look after them...” he says. “I have two gardens,” he adds on as an explanation in case Kite doesn’t know about the second one and thinks he only has the tennis one.

Kite’s eyes narrow and his glasses flash again. Chinen wonders again if it’s intentional.

“I see.” The silence is back again and it stretches out and Chinen eyes the pile of potatoes in the row behind Kite. “What do you want with Hirakoba-kun? You keep staring at him.”

That takes him by surprise and Chinen plucks at the skin on his fingers awkwardly. He... hadn’t realised people had noticed beyond that one comment Hirakoba had made early on.

“I’m not staring at him.”

Kite raises an eyebrow at him and Chinen panics a bit as he turns to pick up a bunch of broccoli at random. “He… he’s very short, I can hardly see him,” Chinen says and the words come out easier than he expects.

He moves to grab some potatoes at random too, pushing past Kite. “You’re very short too. Glasses seem inconvenient,” he adds on and he can hear an intake of breath behind him as he turns to head to the counter to buy them.

Kite doesn’t follow him to the counter and Chinen is surprised to find that maybe he expected him to and is a little… disappointed, maybe? He pays for the vegetables and risks glancing behind him to look at the store as the cashier rings up his total.

The other boy is no longer there, though Chinen spots one other person in their school uniform hanging by the fruit. He feels himself relax a little as he pays and heads back home.

The broccoli is particularly good in the stew that night, they all agree on that. But Chinen is fairly sure that it’s because his mother cooked it and she seemed to have some hidden spice that she hides away from all of them but always makes her meals taste that bit better than anything else.

Chinen mixes the rest of the sauce with his leftover rice and watches his brother reach for second helpings.

He doesn’t think it’s worth going back to that shop again just for the broccoli.


	4. Chapter 4

Chinen has never really understood the point of sitting with someone to have lunch. Going to a different classroom like he knows some of his classmates do just seems tiresome and he always has to dodge around the group in his class this year that like to push their desks together every day.

But he feels like he understands it a little more now, with the few days of having lunch with Tanishi turning into weeks. Chinen had taken his book with him for the first few days to read while eating as he normally did. He’s reading a great psychological thriller at the moment and sometimes stays up late turning pages under the cover with a flashlight, switching it off quickly as he hears the soft creak of the floorboards outside his bedroom door with his mother coming to check on him well past when he should have gone to sleep. 

It’s nice to read at lunch as well, with the soft ocean breeze and sunlight making it a bit less heart racing and doesn’t have him jumping a little as he hears his grandfather sigh and turn over in his sleep in the next room before starting to snore again.

But after the first few lunches with Tanishi, he stopped bringing his book with him since he never opened it, leaving it on his desk instead. He doesn’t mind, but he’s reading a lot slower now.

Tanishi likes the private spot behind the gym that no one else really goes to. It’s always far enough away from the tennis courts that Chinen doesn’t have to listen to the sounds of the balls and feel a strange twinge of guilt. He stretches his legs across the walkway and sighs a little. It’s warm behind here too at lunch time and he sweats a bit as they enter a particularly hot week.

It’s nice, having someone to talk to, even if their conversations are halting at first and Chinen clacks his chopsticks against the side of his lunchbox. But Tanishi never seems to mind; the more silences they have, the more of his lunch he manages to eat and there’s less last minute gulping over his food right before the bells ring to end lunch.

Chinen wonders if the boy ever suffers indigestion from it… he makes some effort to share a serving of bananas with Tanishi the next day, just in case.

The one downside to this though, is that he doesn’t get much gardening done at lunch anymore and with spending lunch times at the gym and afternoons at the tennis courts, the garden near the gym is looking very straggly. Chinen prods at the limp looking leaves of some of his plants and endeavors to look after them a bit better.

Tanishi doesn’t have much of an interest in gardening. Chinen tries once, but the boy is happy enough to sit and watch as Chinen cuts a few plants back and shifts the soil around with his hands, patting it into place. He also brings along some chillies for him to pull the seeds out of and plant, laughing as Chinen’s eyes water and he squints as he accidentally rubs chilli into them.

Chinen punches him for that and they both have to go to the infirmary after lunch, not even noticing the strange looks they get from people in the hallways as they walk, laughing, Tanishi having to lead Chinen in by the elbow.

“So, what do your parents do?” Tanishi asks one day. Tanishi is having some simple fish based lunch today, but the fish is cooked perfectly and Chinen relishes the small bit that gets shared with him. The strange bean curd patty that his sister made is oddly nice as well, if a little dry. Tanishi suggests a range of sauces that could go well with it.

“My mum is an english translator. She’s away a lot...” Chinen says, inspecting the garden briefly. The daises are coming back after just a little bit of extra attention, which he’s glad about.

“Explains your marks in English,” Tanishi says and Chinen nods. Having his mother looking over his shoulder every week has quickly taken him to the top of the class at the subject. 

There’s an awkward pause and Chinen prods at one of the flower buds.

“And your father?”

“Ah...” The sound comes out a little strangled and dies quickly. And then Chinen doesn’t answer for a very long time, but surely Tanishi can see the way his hands clench and he chews the inside of his lip.

He doesn’t know what to say about it and his mind is quite blank. “My grandfather used to be in the military,” he blurts out finally, and he spots Tanishi nodding out of the corner of his eye.

It’s easier to just avoid his gaze and Chinen fusses over his plants some more to keep his hands and mind occupied.

“My parents run a family restaurant,” Tanishi says and Chinen pauses. That explains the quality of Tanishi’s lunch every day. “You should come visit one day, my dad’s the head chef with my uncle.”

He’s never been invited to someone’s place before and Chinen doesn’t know how to respond, staring at Tanishi until he talks again.

“Yeah, sometimes I’m roped into helping out, but the food’s always really good.”

Tanishi is lucky, Chinen decides and he nods and he smiles to himself as the topic changes to Tanishi talking about working at the restaurant. Even if the invitation never comes up again, it’s nice enough knowing that it was offered just that once.

He’s heard people making plans to go to each other’s houses after school and he suddenly understands why. It’s kind of a nice warm feeling.

\--

Tanishi and Hirakoba have another run in a few days after the last as the larger boy is on his way to the gym to have lunch, Chinen finds out. Although Tanishi tries to hide it, Chinen can tell he’s dwelling on it with his grumpy huffs over his food and the way he eats it a bit faster than normal and there’s not as much conversation between them.

Chinen picks dead petals off some of the seaside daisies one at a time instead.

“Why would people dislike each other?” he asks his mother that night as he carefully unfolds and refolds paper napkins. The ones from the shop this time had been a few millimeters off being perfectly folded and it’s been bothering Chinen since his mother had bought them.

He doesn’t think she’ll be buying that brand of napkins again, they’d all commented on it.

Chinen doesn’t understand this concept of disliking people that seems so prevalent as he observes his classmates. He knows his sisters have screamed at him that they hate him, when they’ve fought, but they’ve always hugged and made up easily enough and he plaited their hair as a way of saying sorry.

Maybe he dislikes the fluffy dog on the way to school… but that’s about it that he can think of as he runs his blunt thumbnail along the folded edge. Nothing like the endless drama of changing friendship circles and bickering that he sees from his corner in the classroom.

She pauses with her spoon halfway to her mouth and looks confused at his sudden question. Perhaps she’s thinking this is about his siblings or him having problems at school.

“Tanishi and Hirakoba dislike each other,” he adds on helpfully, to try and give her a bit more context.

“Tanishi and Hirakoba…?” she repeats to herself, sounding even more confused for a moment before she smiles. “Perhaps they just don’t get along, Hiroshi. Sometimes clashing personalities can do that.”

His eyebrows draw together at that. It seems more personal than just their personalities not getting along. And Chinen sees nothing wrong with either of their personalities.

“Or,” she adds on, “They could have had a disagreement when they were younger that’s carried through.”

Chinen nods at that and carefully puts away the refolded napkins, pulling the next pile towards him. 

\--

It takes some time before Chinen can bring himself to ask the question that’s been bothering him all that day. He’d practiced it to his reflection that morning and to his shoes as he put them away in the shoe locker, but it still feels different as he looks at Tanishi’s open face.

“Why don’t you like Hirakoba?” he asks bluntly, stumbling a little over the words and Chinen frowns at his hands.

He can feel Tanishi’s surprise and chances a glance at his expression. There’s no annoyance there that Chinen can see and he lets out a little sigh of relief.

“He’s annoying,” comes the gruff answer and Chinen frowns a bit. “He dated my neighbour last year,” follows after a long pause. “Dumped her because she wasn’t good enough.”

Dating… Chinen knows what that is. He’s watched enough cheesy cartoons with his sister and heard all the gossip in the classroom and he nods. Of course if he’s dated lots of girls, it would explain why Hirakoba’s advice on what to give Chinen’s sister for her birthday had been such a good suggestion.

He must know girls really well.

He thinks about it that afternoon too during classes. Their english teacher got engaged recently, he’s spotted the ring on her finger that flashes and reflects light while she teaches, holding her notebook in her hand. He doesn’t think anyone else in the class has noticed, but he finds himself staring at it more than he does her hair.

Braids is dating Shaved-Hair-At-Back and they spend a lot of english passing notes to each other. One badly folded note lets him spot a coloured love heart on the paper and Chinen taps his pen on his desk, his gaze flicking to the window, feeling like he’s intruded on something. He practises drawing love hearts on his page, discreetly in the corner, but they turn out wonky and asymmetrical and he thinks it’s illogical that hearts aren’t anatomically correct anyway.

Red-ribbons is dating some person from the next door class that Chinen has only seen in last semester’s PE class. But there’s no sign of it as she scribbles notes down furiously and is always prompt to answer when asked. Maybe having distance is a good thing.

Dating seems troublesome.

He does notice sometimes while walking through the school that some of the gardens lose flowers when they’re particularly pretty. He thinks that sometimes they’re given to others as gifts, which he thinks is silly. His slowly growing gouya, or even the herbs he’s scattered throughout his two gardens are much better choices, at least they’re edible.

He’s staring intently at his tennis court garden as he hears the club members start to arrive. He knows their voices now too and he can tell them apart without having to look at them. Hat’s voice is very distinctive, loud and cheerful as he jumps out onto the court.

Glasses’ voice always follows close behind. From what Chinen can gather, they’re in the same class and he wonders if Glasses ever tires of Hat’s exuberance. His voice is crisp and measured and Chinen imagines it’d be quite nice to listen to at length.

Chinen glances at them as he always does and he turns quickly back to his garden when he realises that Glasses is staring at him.

Glasses’ stare is not as nice as his voice.

There’s an uncharacteristic delay before he hears Hirakoba’s voice and Chinen turns as he hears it, already opening his mouth for his usual afternoon greeting. He’s gotten much better at it recently and Hirakoba always waits patiently for him to talk before smiling and saying hello back.

Today though, Hirakoba is walking with a girl next to him and Chinen finds himself gaping a little at the sight. She’s small like Hirakoba and the greeting dies in his mouth.

She must be someone he’s dating.

“Oh! Chinen-kun, hello,” Hirakoba says, a pause in his step as he looks up at him.

Chinen fumbles with words and he notices how Hirakoba reaches out to grab the girl’s hand to stop her from walking ahead. He knows that’s something people dating do, even if he does it with his sisters all the time and even with his brother when they’re crossing the road.

“Do you buy her hair ties and hair pins?” he asks suddenly and Hirakoba looks extremely confused for a moment turning to look at the girl questioningly and then back to Chinen.

“I… I suppose, yes?” he glances at the girl again. “She’s more of a jewelry type though...” 

Chinen notes that down with interest. Perhaps when his sister’s are older they’ll also like jewelry more.

It’s then that he notices Hirakoba is still in his school uniform and there’s a lack of tennis bag with him. “Don’t you have training now?” He looks to the tennis court and Hat and Glasses are lightly hitting balls to each other, though he has a feeling Glasses was watching them just a moment ago.

Hirakoba waves his words away. “Not today. I’m busy.” He smiles and nudges the girl and they set off again. “I’ll see you tomorrow, Chinen-kun.”

Chinen hesitates and clenches his hands reflexively and then unclenches them. “Good afternoon, Hirakoba,” he blurts out and by the way Hirakoba ducks his head, Chinen can tell he’s laughing.

He gets a wave back and Chinen stares after them for a while longer. Save for the longer hair and smaller build of the girl, from the back the two of them look quite similar. 

Maybe it’s because Hirakoba is so short. He really should grow more and Chinen endeavours to tell him so the next time he sees the boy.

–

Tanishi brings up the idea of Chinen coming over for dinner again a few days later and Chinen doesn’t know what to say again.

“My parents said if it’s too far for you, you can stay the night too. You’ll have to share my room though.”

Tanishi has a lot of siblings, he’s learned over the past few weeks. He’s made up a little poem in his mind to recite to try and remember their birth order so he knows when Tanishi talks about them to him.

He also knows Tanishi shares a bedroom with one of his older brothers who’s in his third year of junior high this year. He’s seen the other boy around once, but otherwise he doesn’t see many third years in the corridors anyway.

He fumbles with his answer and Tanishi fidgets a little, watching him with a different intensity. He was waiting for Chinen’s answer, he realised.

“I’ll have to ask my mum...” he finally mumbles.

He doesn’t know how his mother will react to him asking about something like this. He knows she’s always a little wary about Sana and Arisa going to friend’s houses, always making Chinen or his grandfather take them there and pick them up after.

And besides a few sleepovers with Arisa’s best friend in the holidays, there’s never been anything like that.

Does this make Tanishi his best friend, he wonders idly as he listens to the teacher’s explanation in maths.

He has to wait that night for his mother to come home. She’s called ahead to say she’ll be late but he makes himself stay up, sitting at the kitchen table in the dark, staring at the blinking light of the refrigerator.

It’s almost 11 when he hears the crunch of car tyres on the driveway and Chinen blinks himself out of a little doze he slipped into. It feels like the blinking light is burned into his eyes with how intently he’s been staring at it and he perks up a little as he hears the front door open and the sound of his mother taking her heels off.

There’s a creaky floorboard on the way to kitchen and Chinen hears it and he grins as the light in the kitchen switches on, his mother following close behind.

She jumps the moment she spots him and laughs weakly as he straightens up and smiles at her more.

“Hiroshi, that was unexpected,” her laugh is still a little weak and she comes in, pulling out her dinner from the fridge. “Why are you still awake, sweetheart?”

Suddenly he feels quite anxious asking her something like this but she doesn’t seem to notice or mind as she reheats her dinner in the microwave, stirring up the thick tomato sauce occasionally to heat it evenly.

“Tanishi invited me to his house,” he says, twisting his shirt between his fingers. “He said I can sleepover...”

His mother ignores the beeping of the microwave as she turns to stare at him and Chinen can’t understand her expression. Is she angry?

“I don’t have to go...” he says belatedly as the silence drags on. The microwave has stopped beeping too but his mother hasn’t made any move to get her dinner plate out.

She breathes deeply and eventually moves, pulling the chair out from the table and sitting opposite him. “Who’s Tanishi?”

“Tanishi Kei,” he says and the name rolls off his tongue easily now, he’s proud to notice. “He’s… … we have lunch together.”

His mother nods and Chinen stares at her clasped fingers on the tabletop, seeing the light reflexive tightening of her grip before it loosens again as he speaks. “And he invited you to his house? That’s very kind of him.”

Chinen nods. Tanishi sometimes isn’t very kind, but that’s normally in PE and Chinen finds it funny anyway.

“What day were you going to do this?”

Chinen shakes his head and shrugs, twisting his shirt around his fingers again. “I said I’d ask you first….”

His mother smiles at him and reaches across the table to ruffle his hair and Chinen reaches up to finger comb down the front of his hair into his eyes again. It’s getting too long, hanging into his eyes and he can feel the hairs when he blinks.

“I’d prefer to pick you up at night the first time. You can sleep over the next time you go over, maybe.”

And that’s more than enough of an answer for Chinen, who finds that he’s suddenly smiling at her and it’s very hard to stop himself from doing it as well. His mother doesn’t seem to mind too much and she ruffles his hair again before she gets up to fetch her dinner.

“Arrange a day with Tanishi-kun and let me know.” She pauses as she moves to sit down again with her plate. “I’m happy for you, Hiroshi.”

–

A cold front comes through one week, signaling the approach of winter and Chinen finds he has to pull on an extra sweater as the nights get a little cooler. He worries over his plants at school and how they’ll take the dip in temperature. He’s planted a few things he’s never looked after before and he spends the evenings going through his grandfather’s old dusty gardening reference books to look for information.

Tanishi is extremely happy when Chinen tells him he got permission and says they can arrange a day some time next week. He frets a little and chews at the inside of his cheek when he thinks about going to Tanishi’s house.

He’s never been to anyone’s house before, except for the one time in fourth grade when he went to someone’s house to work on a group project. It had been awkward and even though their lunchtimes together were getting more filled with laughter and easy words, he still worries.

He has stopped dwelling on it around Tanishi though, since his shoulders tended to hunch at the thought and Tanishi reacted to that by punching him in the arm and pulling him into a headlock.

Chinen ponders over his flourishing gouya plant in the tennis garden that afternoon. The first few vegetables had been very small, but they were growing slowly bigger each time. He was having some difficulty telling when they were ripe though, the faded black and white pictures in the reference books not telling him much.

He’d tried one of them at home, but it had been even too bitter that his grandfather’s usual stoic face had scrunched up and Chinen had forgotten how horrible the taste was just to laugh at his grandfather and younger brother.

The lady with the dog liked gouya though, he’d learned when she’d spotted him one afternoon carrying back the rest. She’d crossed the road to inspect them, letting him know which ones were ripe and which weren’t, giving him helpful hints that Chinen tried to listen to and remember even as he warily eyed the fluffy dog that was pulling on the lead to try and jump on his knees.

It’s cold today, with a brisk wind but Chinen doesn’t think it’s too bad. It’s only bad when the cold wind manages to blow up under his shirt, but when he’s hunched down next to the garden bed it’s not a problem. And with the sun still beating down, it’s enough to keep him warm.

He can hear complaints about the cold from the appearing tennis club members and Hirakoba looks particularly miserable with his sports jacket zipped up to the neck. Maybe that’s why they’re taking so long to actually start playing tennis.

Chinen thinks he’d be much warmer if he wore long pants instead of shorts, but he tries to phrase that to say it out loud and it’s awkward.

“Oi, Chinen-kun!” Hirakoba calls out suddenly and Chinen nearly drops his little hand spade as he twists around to look at them again.

Hirakoba is waving his hand at him as if he wants Chinen to come closer… but that doesn’t seem right. Chinen waves back instead, mimicking the hand movement and tries to ignore the resulting laughter from Hirakoba.

“Come here,” Hirakoba says, and he’s already approaching the fence as Chinen carefully gets up from his knees and dusts off his pants. 

He’s so aware of people staring and he tenses, his shoulders hunching and his feet drag a little more with each step towards the fence. It seems like miles even though it’s just a scant few metres away.

“Aren’t you cold?” Hirakoba asks, looking up and down Chinen critically and Chinen shakes his head. The sun is bright today at least and it’s a fine temperature still.

Hirakoba frowns and moves to open the gate into the tennis courts, waving his hand at Chinen again… to… come inside the courts? His outdoor shoes are all wrong and he tries to scrunch up his toes in them and he fidgets as Hirakoba watches him expectantly.

He eventually, so reluctantly sidles onto the courts and Hirakoba grins at him. “Stand like this,” he says, holding his arms out in front of him and Chinen unquestioningly does it.

He tenses up as Hirakoba backs up against him, twitching as his arms are moved to drape over Hirakoba’s shoulders.

This is… weird.

“That’s better,” Hirakoba says, sounding rather smug.

It’s a little weird, he hasn’t even hugged his sisters like this and Chinen experimentally pats Hirakoba’s front with his hand, hearing the strange sound as his hand hits the slick fabric of his jacket.

“Hirakoba-kun, what are you doing?” It’s Glasses, Chinen can see him approaching as he rests his chin on top of Hirakoba’s head and pats his front again.

“I’m staying warm. Chinen-kun’s a very good heater!” Hirakoba calls back. Chinen makes a slight move to pull away and is stopped by a noise and a hand on his wrist.

“Start warming up properly,” Glasses says and he’s approaching now, his glasses glinting and the hand on Chinen’s wrist tightens.

He can feel Hirakoba laughing. “You’re just jealous you didn’t think of this first, Eishirou. It’s very effective.” Hirakoba smiles and shifts a little. “I’ll move when the fatty coach gets here.”

Glasses frowns at them, but he backs away again. Even so, Chinen can see him continuing to watch them with his unnerving stare that Chinen has decided that he definitely doesn’t like. Chinen pats Hirakoba again and he isn’t sure what to say now. It’s not so weird now though, and he finds himself relaxing a little even.

“Do you go to other people’s houses?” he asks suddenly, his upcoming visit to Tanishi’s house popping into his mind. He won’t say whose house though, since he knows that will probably just annoy Hirakoba, even if he still doesn’t quite understand it.

“Hrm?” Hirakoba twists slightly to glance over his shoulder up at him awkwardly.

… Maybe that was the wrong question to ask. Of course Hirakoba goes to other people’s houses. It’s what friends do, right? And Hirakoba tends to have a lot of friends, or at least people surrounding him every day.

“Do you have fun?”

Hirakoba looks confused again, and Chinen finds himself staring a bit, viewing Hirakoba’s expression from the different angle.

“I do. A lot,” Hirakoba says eventually. “I went to Kai’s house the other day, actually. It was great.”

Kai seems to have looked over in their direction as if he’d heard his name being said. Chinen pulls a face at him and Kai flinches back and it’s hard not to laugh softly to himself.

He has so many other questions – what do you _do_ at someone else’s house? Surely it has to be different to what he does at home for it to be so great… and does he need to _bring_ anything with him?

But before he can even mouth the questions to himself, the gate opens and Hirakoba makes a strange _urgh_ noise.

“Hirakoba! Get your ass over with the rest of the team.”

It’s the coach and Hirakoba reluctantly pulls away and gives him a wry smile before jogging away. It feels weird now with nothing in front of him and Chinen fidgets in the now bare space, pulling at the hem of his shirt.

The coach looks like he’s just woken up and Chinen stares at the tiny spots of what have to be sauce on his shirt. He wonders if he had slept through the afternoon after lunch. Being an adult like that must be nice.

“Get off the courts,” the coach snaps at him and Chinen jumps a bit, stares at the man’s squinting eyes for a long moment before he hurries off the court. 

He’s too aware of people staring at him again when he returns to his garden, both people from the tennis club and the coach and Chinen’s hands shake a little as he tries to weed. He clenches his fingers together and sighs as he stands up again.

He’ll have to give up for the day.


	5. Chapter 5

Chinen thinks it’s amazing how time seems to have messed itself up recently. The week seems to drag more often than not and he finds himself impatient for lunch time and then the end of the day. 

They’re still looking at geology in science. They’ve got a prac teacher at the moment who shows them all how tectonic plates work with chewy chocolate bars. The rest of the class enjoys it immensely with a lot of pleased talking when they’re allowed to eat the chocolates after. Chinen doesn’t enjoy it very much though, mostly because the caramel seemed to have found its way under his fingernails and dirt sticks to it during his afternoon gardening time.

Surely it was just easier to show them with diagrams how the lava moves up through the ground without getting chocolate all over their hands.

He often catches his teachers watching him, particularly in PE where he still sits with Tanishi. It’s the only class he spends with someone, the rest of the time quietly sitting in his seat at the back of the classroom, staring out the window. The teachers don’t say anything when the two of them decide not to participate for the lesson, though he always notices them watching them for the duration of the lessons.

They never bother them though and Chinen learns to ignore them. It’s easy to, with Tanishi making jokes in his ear and Chinen grins at their classmates as he watches them.

The last few days of the week skip by so quickly that even looking back, Chinen has little recollection of what they did. What’s most important though, is that suddenly it’s the afternoon that he’s going home with Tanishi to spend the evening.

He’d arrived at school extra early that day to look after his tennis court side garden, so they can go home together. Chinen picks at the skin between his fingers as he waits in the last period of the day, for once staring at the clock instead of the blonde hair of his english teacher – she has it done up in an interesting twist with a frangipani clip though, he’s noticed that much at least.

And then all too quickly, the bell rings and Chinen has to carefully check for what must be at least the 10th time that day, that the carefully wrapped box his mother had given him that morning is still in his bag. He packs away his books, so aware of the time as he does. They had to meet at the shoe lockers at the end of school and Chinen has to double back to his desk to get his calculator before he leaves it behind.

Chinen twists his fingers anxiously as he waits, having put his shoes on and so aware of how awkward he feels surrounded by all these chatting people and him not doing anything.

He can see Tanishi’s locker right next to his though and he wonders how it’s taken him so long to realise where it was. He supposes he just doesn’t come at the same time as the other boy and he’s always late to leave with staying behind to look after his gardens.

“Hey, Chinen!” There’s the familiar friendly blow to his back and Chinen catching himself before he hits the shoe lockers.

Tanishi seems just as excited as he is, he realises and Chinen feels himself almost vibrate with energy as they head out of the school gate together to the bus. It’s like that time he went all out in a spar with his grandfather and the adrenaline that coursed through his body for at least an hour after.

Tanishi doesn’t live very far from Higa, apparently and Chinen remarks on that as they get off the first and only bus and make their way down the road.

“How do you get to school, then?” Tanishi asks and Chinen adjusts his bag on his shoulder.

“I take two buses,” he says and he glances at Tanishi’s surprised expression. “It takes about forty minutes.”

Thankfully at the times he goes to school and comes home, the bus is always pretty much on time. And there were regulars on both of the buses that he knows by sight now. The man who always reads the paper on the way in, his brows scrunched together and Chinen likes to count the number of wrinkles there; there’s the lady whose nail colour changes every day and she smiles at him when she notices him looking at them.

There’s a boy that takes the second bus with him too, though sometimes Chinen notices he’s not there, but he ends up at school regardless. Chinen wonders how he gets there on the days he’s not on the bus, though no answers came to him no matter how hard he stared at him on the bus ride home one day.

Tanishi’s frowning a bit though and Chinen whacks him on the arm as they walk. He doesn’t know what’s making Tanishi frown – maybe he’s thinking about how long Chinen’s commute to school is? That seems like something he’d do. It doesn’t matter though. 

Chinen changes the topic and Tanishi starts complaining about his science teacher – why couldn’t they have a prac teacher at the moment who did fun things? Tanishi barely notices as Chinen grabs him and pulls him to the other side of the road to avoid a dog walking towards them, just a small pause in his talking before he starts again.

–

Tanishi’s restaurant is nice, Chinen decides. All wooden inside and scrubbed but very clean table tops throughout. He can hear the sounds of two men in the kitchen and smell… _something_ nice starting to be cooked.

They don’t go to restaurants very often, probably not since Chinen was younger with his father. His grandfather sometimes treats all of them to naughty cakes at the local bakery after extracting solemn promises not to tell their mother, but it’s been a long time since he’s been in a proper restaurant.

Tanishi is very lucky, Chinen decides.

“I’m home!”

Chinen jumps in surprise at the sudden call, and even moreso at the answering call from the kitchen.

“Kei! Come help me with--” 

A head appears in the kitchen and the voice cuts off as the man – Tanishi’s father, Chinen guesses – notices him. “Oh, your friend’s here.”

“This is Chinen Hiroshi. He’s my friend from school.”

Any other time, Chinen might point out that it’s obvious they’re from the same school, since they’re wearing the same uniform. But that’s not important anymore.

Friend.

He stares wide eyed at Tanishi as the boy chatters on and Chinen isn’t really even 100% sure about what Tanishi is talking about anymore.

_Friend_.

_Friend_ from school.

He doesn’t think anyone’s ever called him that before.

“You alright there?” Tanishi asks him and Chinen chokes a little at the whack on the back that accompanies the question. “Come on, you have to see my room!”

Tanishi’s room is smaller than Chinen’s but he has a feeling it has to do with the second bed and the sheer amount of _stuff_ that both Tanishi and his brother seem to have accumulated. Chinen stares at the bookcase of manga and the posters hung up on the wall.

It’s smaller, but somehow more inviting than Chinen’s own room with its succulents growing on his windowsill and neatly organised desk. He feels rather inspired to personalise his room a bit more now.

They sit and talk while they wait, sharing a bowl of dip that Tanishi’s mother dropped off. Chinen picks at the celery and peels off little strips of it while he chews on crackers with a spicy flavour from the dip. Tanishi seems more relaxed here than he is at school and Chinen finds himself relaxing a little more too, curling his toes in his socks and leaning back against Tanishi’s mattress.

Tanishi’s brother pops his head in briefly too, to get changed, say hi and then leave again. Chinen can hear other footsteps outside, but no one bothers them, even as Chinen stops talking each time he hears them at first. It’s a busy thoroughfare in the Tanishi house he’s learning and soon the footsteps just fade into background noise and he can ignore it easily enough.

It’s easy to ignore the sheer numbers of siblings Tanishi has while they hide in his room. It’s not so easy when they get called down to dinner.

It’s overwhelming.

They have dinner in the early opening hours of the restaurant, all of the family sitting down at one of the big tables, Tanishi’s mother regularly bringing out new dishes from the kitchen. She skillfully alternates between serving the early customers and her family, with sometimes one of the siblings getting up to help as well.

He has to go through their names one at a time to try and put faces to them all and with them all sitting out of age order, it makes it even harder. It doesn’t help that sometimes the ages don’t quite match up with how they look.

Oldest brother Tanishi is visiting for the night and Chinen counts three crows feet around each of his eyes and his hair is slightly longer than the rest. He’s at least the most obviously eldest of the siblings and he talks about his wife and Chinen wonders how old he is.

Second brother Tanishi is visiting as well, and he’s wearing a particularly loud shirt that pulls at the buttons around his chest. Chinen wonders if he always wears loud shirts and decides he likes them. He tells the man that as well which prompts the whole table to laugh and apparently Chinen will be getting one next time he comes over.

Third brother Tanishi is in high school and comes in late after cram school. He’s slightly smaller than Chinen and Tanishi are – Chinen wonders if he’s going to be the shortest of the males in his family.

Oldest sister Tanishi pats him on the head when he comes in, just a little bit taller than him though he notices she’s wearing high heels. She looks a lot like Tanishi’s mother and he imagines if they’re both working, from the back they might be confused.

Fourth brother Tanishi Chinen already knows from the few times he’s spotted the other boy at school. He looks different though, in casual clothes as he slouches at the table instead of in uniform. He talks with them easily enough though and at one point, him and Chinen have a conversation about one of the teacher’s knuckle cracking habit.

(Chinen doesn’t like it and he scrambles away as Tanishi’s brother pretends to go to crack his knuckles).

The other Tanishi sister is wearing clothing just a little bit too big for her and Chinen looks at the seams and wonders if they’re second hand from her sister. It would make sense and given how well dressed Tanishi’s older sister is, it doesn’t seem like any particular hardship. This sister though, ducks around a corner when Chinen comes down the stairs from the main house and has to be teased out to join them at the table.

The two younger brother Tanishi’s are twins, still in elementary school and Chinen can’t tell if they get along well or dislike each other with their constant bickering. They look identical though and Chinen spends an inordinate amount of time squinting at them to try and pick out the small details. One of them has hair on the left of his part that sticks up slightly more than the other and maybe the other’s smile is more lopsided.

The whole family seems to be able to tell them apart though and Chinen is determined.

There’s a few customers there as well, regulars that his mother greets by name when they come in and they seem to just meld into the background of the Tanishi family dinner as though this is completely normal for them.

She keeps offering Chinen new dish after dish and all of them are delicious that he can’t bring himself to say no to trying at least a little of all of them. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt this full before though, not even when his mother had bought him a large cake for his birthday a few years ago and he’d been determined to eat all of it that day.

There’s so many conversations going on around him as well, all relaxed and laughing and Chinen just sits and listens to all of them for a while. Tanishi is telling his mother about Chinen’s gardens and his words make a warm spot twist in his stomach. It seems the other boy has been listening to Chinen’s sometimes inane ramblings about his plants to fill the silences while they spend lunchtime together.

“Ah, Tanishi-kun,” Chinen starts and he’s suddenly aware of multiple people looking at him. Of course, they’re all Tanishi’s… he hadn’t thought about this.

He flounders a little and Tanishi laughs and pounds him on the back in his usual friendly way.

“Just call me Kei already. It’s less confusing.”

“Kei,” Chinen repeats and he doesn’t think he’s ever seen Tanishi grin that widely before.

“Kei…-kun,” he adds on and he laughs with Tanishi. It feels a little less weird with the honorific attached, but as he mouths to name to himself later, it rolls off his tongue almost as easily as ‘Tanishi’ ever had.

Hearing Tanishi call him ‘Hiroshi’ seems almost natural too and Chinen barely blinks at the change.

He eats more than he could ever believe possible that night for dinner and he gapes as Tanishi’s mother surprises them all by bringing out a cake after. It’s got candles on it and a few sparklers for added effect and Chinen stares at it.

It looks better than the cakes his mother gets from the shop in town, a bit more haphazard and less professional, but the ‘Happy Birthday Kei!’ was neatly iced on anyway.

“It’s your birthday?” he asks, turning to look at Tanishi who looks suddenly quite uncomfortable and fidgets in a way that Chinen recognises as his own.

“Yes and he’s never brought a friend over to celebrate it with him,” Tanishi’s mother suddenly intervenes before Tanishi can answer and Chinen finds himself suddenly enveloped in a hug from behind. “Thank you Chinen-kun.”

Chinen doesn’t know how to respond for a long moment and Tanishi is turning red next to him. He flounders and blurts out the first thing to come to mind. “Kei-kun can come to my house for mine,” he says, slapping his hand down on the table top and Tanishi is staring at him. “My grandfather gets drunk and sings happy birthday every year.”

There’s an awkward pause in the immediate vicinity of him – the conversations at the other end of the table keep going with no interruptions.

And then Tanishi starts laughing, and so is Tanishi’s brother and Chinen starts too. And just like that, the cake is being cut and Chinen stares at the giant slice he’s handed that he swears is bigger than all the others.

\--

They’re already planning their first sleepover the next week and Chinen gets a thrill as they even _talk_ about the possibility of Tanishi coming over on the weekend maybe, and spending the night.

He still has to check with his mother, especially since he doesn’t think _anyone_ in his family has ever had a friend stay over, but he twists his fingers together and tries not to think about the possibility of her saying no.

She’d been almost apologetic when she’d shown up after work to take him home and she’d spent almost an hour standing and talking to Tanishi’s mother while his siblings took over the task of serving customers so she was free. She’d asked him a few gentle questions on the ride home but Chinen had otherwise been happy to sit and stare out the window of the car as they listened to the music on the radio together.

They’re still left largely alone for lunch times, people seem to have figured out that there’s two first years who have claimed that particular back area. Chinen supposes that them both being taller now than a lot of the third years even, help with not being disturbed.

He thinks he’s had another growth spurt, the sinks in the bathroom at school suddenly seem a lot lower down than they were at the start of the year.

Today is different though, Chinen hears the footsteps approaching them and he looks up from his garden where he’s pulling out the usual weeds that seem to growth relentlessly. It’s Glasses and Chinen stares at him. 

“Tanishi-kun,” Kite says and Tanishi grunts, lowering his lunch box to look at the other boy as well. Chinen turns back to his garden, but his hands don’t move as he tries to listen in and he’s so sure that Kite has noticed this.

“I saw you at the tournament on the weekend. You did well against Hirakoba-kun.”

Chinen glances at Tanishi – what tournament on the weekend? - and the question is on his tongue but it dies as he sees Tanishi scowling at his lunch box.

“I don’t hit girls,” Tanishi finally says and Chinen squints as he tries to think of context for that. Was the tournament on martial arts? That would explain a lot… he vaguely remembers Tanishi’s parents talking about it while they were having dinner? But there’s been a lot of conversations happening at the dinner table, it’d been hard to keep track of everything.

“I’m recruiting people for the tennis club, who have experience with martial arts,” Kite says.

But before he can say anything else, Tanishi starts laughing. “I’m not interested in your stupid club.”

Chinen looks at Kite then, and freezes as he sees the boy starting to visibly look annoyed. The atmosphere is getting tense too between them and Chinen panics, not sure what to do.

He flings his hands up and dirt flies at Kite. Chinen scrambles back and nervously wipes his hands on his pants, eyeing Kite’s shocked and confused expression.

“Wha--”

“Hirakoba-kun isn’t a girl. And neither is Glasses-kun,” he tells Tanishi, who snorts as he puts the lid on his lunch box. He doesn’t know what to think about Kite’s proposition to Tanishi to join the tennis club and he doesn’t even try to process it. “You shouldn’t punch either of them, Kei-kun.”

Tanishi’s given name rolls off his tongue so easily and Chinen finds himself grinning a bit at it. His smile falters though as he realises that Kite is still staring at him, speechless. Chinen gets the feeling that it doesn’t happen very much, Kite always seems to know what to say whenever he sees the other boy from a distance with his friends.

Maybe he should explain what had just happened to Kite? He seemed very confused.

“I’m on given name-basis with Tanishi Kei now,” he says and Kite just stares at him for a long moment before he jerks his head.

There’s an awkward pause between the three of them and Chinen bobs his head at Kite before he grabs Tanishi’s arm and pulls the other boy away from the scene. It’s nearly the end of lunch anyway.

“You should probably punch my sister though, she’s very good at attacking back,” Chinen says, starting the conversation up again as if there had been no interruption at all and Tanishi laughs, falling back into it easily enough as well.

“Yeah, she’s been taught a good punch by your grandfather!”

Chinen glances back instinctively at Kite who is still standing there, watching them with a speculative look on his face that Chinen decides straight away that he doesn’t like. 

–

He asks Tanishi about the tournament the next day, lined up for once in the cafeteria as Chinen awkwardly clutches his wallet and looks at the menu.

There’d been some confusion with his mother’s schedule last night that had resulted in her leaving them all some money on the counter before she’d dashed off to work late in the night. Chinen would have been happy to make lunches for his siblings, but, thinking that his mother was going to look after it, he’d slept in to wake up to an apologetic note instead.

He’s never been here, but Tanishi has and the boy is happy to tell him what he thinks is the best things to eat as he clutches his own lunch box and waits patiently with Chinen.

“It was just a local tournament. My instructor decided to sign me up.” Tanishi grumbles and they shuffle forward a little in the line. There’s someone at the counter who seems to be taking a long time to decide and Chinen twists the zip in his fingers. “Some people from school were there, you’d probably recognise a few of them.”

Chinen nods and looks around the cafeteria. It’s interesting how many people choose to eat lunch there. Maybe they should try it today. But the idea of leaving his garden for a day makes him a little anxious.

“Kite Eishirou won,” Tanishi says and Chinen makes a small noise. He hadn’t realised that Kite was so good at martial arts, though maybe it makes sense, thinking about how the boy looks when he plays tennis.

“You know Glasses-kun?” he asks and Chinen swallows before he corrects himself. “Kite-kun?”

“We went to elementary school together.”

That’s all that Tanishi seems to want to say on the topic, but it doesn’t matter all that much because suddenly they’re at the front of the line and Chinen is fumbling with his coins and Tanishi ends up ordering for him. It’s too much food, but it doesn’t matter. Maybe he can take some of the packaged bread home to share with his siblings that afternoon.

It’s nicer to sit outside together, they decide as they both look around the cafeteria. There’s too many people in here and they can’t talk properly.

They’re just heading out when Chinen spots two very familiar looking people and he grabs Tanishi by the arm before he beelines over to them.

Hirakoba looks surprised and Kai looks almost unhappy as he approaches.

He’s been worrying about his conversation with Kite from the previous day, the look in Kite’s face after when they’d left still burned into his memory. He’d spoken to his grandfather about it the night before and had lain in bed thinking over it.

His grandfather had – probably rightly – said that Kite might have taken Chinen’s words as an insult and Chinen twisted his blankets into knots as he stared at the dark ceiling. His mother had chimed in at that point and said that the best way to deal with accidentally insulting people was to apologise, but the speculative look in Kite’s eyes makes Chinen nervous still and he hasn’t seen the other boy today in the hallways.

These two were always with him though, so surely they could pass on the message to him.

“I spoke to Kite Eishirou yesterday,” he says and Hirakoba raises his eyebrows slightly. The boy’s smiling though at least and Chinen takes a few deep breaths, ignoring Tanishi’s grumbling behind him.

“I said he’s not a girl. And you’re not a girl either.”

Hirakoba and Kai both laugh, almost simultaneously at Chinen’s words and Hirakoba reaches to pat Chinen on the arm, even as he waves his hand in front of his face and tries to smother his laughter.

“I’m glad you’ve figured that out, Chinen-kun.”

Kai is gaping a little at him and Chinen reaches out automatically to pat him on the head, as he would for his sisters who sometimes had the same confused look when they were reading things or watching television.

“You’re not a girl either, Hat-kun,” he says and Hirakoba makes a bit of a strangled noise even as Kai looks pained and Chinen pulls his hand away.

It takes a moment, but Chinen zooms back to the original purpose of coming over here. “Do you think Glasses-kun was insulted?” He knows he sounds a little anxious and he crunches up the edge of one of the bread rolls Tanishi had insisted he try.

The two of them exchange glances and Kai shrugs. “Probably not. I mean, it’s true?” Kai sounds a little doubtful though and Hirakoba looks like he wants to laugh again.

“Tell him it wasn’t meant to be.” 

“Let’s go, Hiroshi,” Tanishi finally says, tugging a bit on Chinen’s shirt before either of them could reply though. 

Yes, they’ve been in the cafeteria too long. Though as he thinks about it, there’s a chance people might have bravely taken up lunch spots in their usual area and they could now chase them away.

“Okay.” Chinen bobs his head at the two one last time before he clutches his food closely to him and moves to follow Tanishi away.

“Oi, Chinen-kun,” Hirakoba calls out after him and Chinen pauses. “Are you coming to tennis practice this afternoon?”

He’s never been asked that before and for a moment, Chinen doesn’t know how to answer. But, of course he is, when he really thinks about it. He has to look after his garden and Hirakoba… is just phrasing it differently than Chinen would have.

He nods though and waves his hand and Hirakoba’s face relaxes into its usual smile. Chinen can’t help but smile back a bit too before he turns and heads out of the cafeteria with Tanishi.


	6. Chapter 6

Chinen likes routine. It’s predictable and he always knows what is coming. There are no unexpected conversations that he has to try to fumble his way through.

It’s normal now to say good morning as he walks through the classroom door, even though no one ever responds, even as they fall silent as he walks past them to his desk at the back. That desk never changes either, even though the people around him have changed.

It’s also normal now to spend break with Tanishi, meeting up at what Chinen proudly calls _their_ spot in the school. Tanishi was away a couple of days ago, sick with a stomach bug and while he gardened the same as every other lunch, it was now weird to not hear the other boy chattering away or his chopsticks clacking about his lunchbox.

After school he sees to the tennis club garden bed and says “good afternoon” to Hirakoba there, and sometimes Hat-kun if he comes early enough to practice. Hirakoba always has a strange smile on his face and Chinen tries to mimic it to Hat-kun.

For some reason, Hat-kun never has quite the same response that he does when he gets smiled at in that way.

Routine is good. Routine is predictable and Chinen doesn’t worry so much when everything falls into place every day after the next.

But he’s also come to enjoy the small changes to his routine, like when Tanishi invites him over yet again for another dinner at his house after school. It means that he can’t spend the afternoon with his garden near the tennis courts, but Chinen doesn’t mind too much. Instead he enjoys how he has to refuse what feels like his tenth serving of all the delicious dishes that are placed in front of him.

Tanishi just laughs and says he has hollow legs, before reaching across the steal the last piece of sizzling beef from the centre plate. Chinen isn’t sure what he means by that, but he sucks the last of the sauce from his chopsticks and tries not to think too hard about it.

Sometimes Tanishi just says strange things like that.

They still haven’t managed to go to Chinen’s house for a sleepover, though his mother had been very apologetic about her last minute work trip that got in the way of their first plan..

“Sorry Hiroshi, but it’s an urgent conference I can’t get out of,” she says, ruffling his hair as he hunches in the garden.

He’d already started figuring out where he was going to lay the extra futon out in his room and what to feed Tanishi. He knows the other boy had gotten his bag out to pack too and he dreads having to tell him tomorrow that the sleepover was cancelled.

“I want to be here to look after the two of you for your first sleepover,” she explains, which makes sense but Chinen still picks at the skin between his toes and scrunches the blades of grass between them.

He dislikes changes to his mother’s work routine most of all, even though they happen all the time.

But it’s not all that bad. Tanishi shrugs and just invites Chinen over _again_ , and there’s spare ribs that drip sauce everywhere when he tries to transfer one to his plate. And that niht they kick Tanishi’s brothers off the television so they can play video games together.

Chinen’s never played before and the controller feels awkward in his hands as Tanishi’s siblings crowd around and offer him various bits of advice.

It’s lots of fun even though he loses at every single game they try and play. He doesn’t mind.

Still, he can’t help but notice the half packed bag that sits in the corner of Tanishi’s room as they go up there after, or that Tanishi skates around the topic.

–

Maybe Chinen’s mother worries about Tanishi coming over as much as he does late at night when trying to get to sleep, which is why it hasn’t happened yet. Chinen looks around his house as he returns – it’s dark and quiet, his siblings long gone to bed and his grandfather sitting in his room with a cup of tea and a book – and tries to think of what might make her worry.

Their house is always nice and tidy. While his cooking and that of his grandfather’s isn’t that amazing and restaurant quality, it’s not _bad_ and he enjoys it. Their garden is always well cared for.

His room is brightening up slowly as he adds more decorations to it.

The only thing that he can think of _really_ is morning training with his grandfather. And, as Chinen finds himself lying on his back the next morning after his grandfather sweeps his feet out from under him, maybe that is something he should have thought of before as well.

“Get up, Hiroshi,” his grandfather says and Chinen pushes himself up, rubbing at his hipbone. His joints have been hurting more lately and he sighs at the idea of yet another growth spurt just around the corner.

There’s a long pause between them before his grandfather lowers his guard and looks at him. “What wrong? You’re not focused.” The man’s eyes narrow. “Is it because of that school you’re going to?”

His grandfather hadn’t approved of his school choice, he knows that, even with how much he encourages Chinen’s gardening hobby. Chinen shakes his head and fidgets, letting his feet slide out of stance to scrunch in the grass.

There’s a hole in the waistband of his pants and he clenches his fingers together to stop himself from making it bigger.

“If I brought a friend over, would you make him spar you?” he asks and his grandfather frowns slightly. Yes, the answer is yes, of course he would. Chinen could read that in the old man’s face easily enough.

“Does your friend do martial arts?”

Chinen nods. He hasn’t seen Tanishi actually _do_ any, but he can’t imagine the boy being bad at it. He can see the balance and training and precision when they participate in PE sometimes. And he knows he’s been in tournaments, and surely that means he can’t be bad?

“He does. So does Glasses-kun and Hirakoba-kun. They were at a tournament together,” he adds on helpfully.

He belatedly realises that his grandfather doesn’t know who they are, but before Chinen can start to explain, he sees the subtle shifting of weight that he’s learned pre-empts a strike.

“You can spar together,” his grandfather says and Chinen just manages to block the sudden attack. “You need to practise with other people sometimes.”

Chinen nods, it’s a small comfort that at least he won’t be throwing Tanishi into a session straight away with his grandfather. A small comfort that doesn’t last as he gets hit and finds himself on his back again.

–

“You should plant more flowers,” a voice cuts across his thoughts that afternoon and Chinen looks up to see Hirakoba standing beside him, looking at the garden. “And then you can get rid of the goya and have nice things in there instead.”

Chinen glances at the boy and then at his garden. It’s autumn and… well, he supposes Hirakoba doesn’t know that most of the things he’s planted only flower in spring.

“It’s nearly winter,” he says and Hirakoba blinks at him. There’s an awkward pause and Chinen doesn’t know what else to say and Hirakoba is looking at the garden again. Maybe he should look at organising it so he has plants flowering all year around and Chinen’s hands pause for a moment as he ponders this.

He goes back to pulling dead leaves off the plants before he stops again. Hirakoba still hasn’t moved, even though he can hear talking behind them on the tennis courts already. 

“Do you have sleepovers with friends?” he asks and he shreds apart a brown leaf. It’s dry and crumbles between his fingertips until Chinen has to wipe them off onto his pant leg.

“Yes...” Hirakoba sounds a little cautious and Chinen glances at him. “Why? Did you want one with me?” Even though he sounds wary, he’s still got his strange smile on.

“Not with you.” He doesn’t know how to interpret the sudden change in expression that Hirakoba was now giving him, so Chinen turns back to his leaf shredding. He should have expected that though, Hirakoba seems like he has a lot of sleepovers with his many friends.

“So you need… advice?” Hirakoba asks after a pause and Chinen looks at him in surprise before nodding.

Hirakoba is back to smiling now and Chinen lets himself relax a little. The boy turns away to face the tennis courts where Hat-kun is now, calling his name.

“Make sure you wear clothes during them when you sleep.”

Chinen frowns. Why wouldn’t he wear clothes? It’s cold at night now and just an extra blanket isn’t quite as effective as wearing pyjamas. Even if his are soft and worn from many washes, and a bit short in the ankle and wrists.

Hirakoba laughs softly to himself. “Some people get uncomfortable when you sleep naked with them.”

That doesn’t help him understand at all, but before he can ask for a further explanation, Hirakoba is heading off towards the courts, leaving Chinen to stare after him and wonder.

–

He really shouldn’t have worried so much.

His mother returns from her work trip with a box of questionable sweets that Chinen carefully unwraps to have with a cup of tea while he sits with his mother in the kitchen, listening to her talking to Tanishi’s mother on the phone.

_They’re_ making arrangements to have Tanishi come over and spend the night one day after school the next week, his mother’s planner laid out on the table so she can pencil in the times to make sure it doesn’t fall through again.

The sticky filling gets on Chinen’s fingers, but he’s practically vibrating with excitement as his mother writes “Tanishi Kei visits” on the Friday of the next week. Which means they could have a lazy morning and not worry about getting to school the next day.

Chinen frets when Friday afternoon finally arrives though.

He had to have a talk with his grandfather to not beat up Tanishi too much on Saturday morning – the old man had just grumbled at him and Chinen doesn’t know if that’s a good or bad reaction. He has to leave his garden another day without being looked after, but he sprinkles in some extra water and hopes for the best, promising to come back on Monday and look after it properly.

Besides, they have to take a longer route back to his place because Tanishi insists on having to go home before they can catch the bus. Chinen picks at his fingernails as he tries to think about bus schedules and not look at his watch.

He can’t complain though, when Tanishi’s mother insists on feeding them afternoon tea – biscuits that are nicer than anything he’s ever had, store bought or hand made, before. The restaurant is quiet without the rest of the Tanishi family home yet and so they sit at the largest table, stretching out their legs to the other side and laugh together as a bit of biscuit falls into Chinen’s drink.

Even more surprising is when Tanishi’s mother pushes a stack of containers into his arms as they prepare to leave. Dinner for his whole family, she tells him, though as Chinen has a peek at the huge mountain of tupperware, he’s sure that it’s at least three times at much as they need.

The bus rides don’t seem as long when he’s sitting next to a friend, he realises and Chinen makes sure to point out all the regulars to Tanishi.

The lady with the painted nails – bright turquoise blue with flashes of gold on them, today – and she smiles as normal when she hears Chinen point out her nails to Tanishi.

The man whose combover doesn’t quiet hide the fact that his bald spot is growing is reading a horror novel today. Chinen glances at the cover and notes it down to read himself.

The man whose shoes go through cycles of being polished and scuffed at the toes. Today they’re looking a bit scuffed around the edges.

Even the strange kid who goes to their school is there that day, even though he only rides the bus sporadically. Chinen hadn’t been expecting him, especially since they had caught a different bus to normal. Maybe he’s also having a sleepover with a friend – Chinen smiles at him at the possible shared camaraderie. 

“Oh, that’s Shiranui Tomoya,” Tanishi says and the boy looks over at them, his eyes wide. His hair is flopping in his eyes, almost as badly as Chinen’s own. Except somehow, Chinen doesn’t think that Shiranui Tomoya has a collections of fruit clips in the bottom of his bag if he needs to get it out of his face. “He’s in our year. I think he’s in Kite Eishirou’s class? I’m not sure.”

Chinen nods and stares at him more. It makes the other boy look away, and Chinen frowns as the bus stops and Shiranui gets off – four stops too early.

“He’s been in a few tournaments with me too, he’s pretty good!” Tanishi doesn’t seem to have noticed that Shiranui’s left them. “He only competes sometimes though. Some people think it’s because he’s too poor to do it all the time.”

That makes Chinen fidget more and he shuffles his feet in the little foot room he has.

He’s never been in a tournament before at all, at least Shiranui’s been in some. He’s seen flyers for them on the table and seen his grandfather looking at them when he thinks Chinen isn’t around. He knows his grandfather has been in them in the past, both before and after his time in the military. Chinen has seen the trophies and certificates tucked away in storage boxes in the attic.

The entry fee is expensive, he knows that. And while he’s been curious about what they’re like, even moreso since meeting Tanishi… he’ll probably be knocked out in the first rounds anyway.

He just hums at Tanishi’s comment though and the topic changes easily enough.

–

Any lingering awkwardness is long gone by the time they make it to Chinen’s house, brave the flood of his excited silbings - “Hiroshi brought home a friend! Who’s just as tall as him!” - and make it up to his room to put down their bags.

Chinen twists his fingers as Tanishi looks around his room, standing awkwardly near the door as he glances around at all the new things he’s put in there since.

It’s not as welcoming as Tanishi’s, he knows that. In stark contrast it’s… very clean and almost empty, but he likes the little cheap gachapon toys he’s hidden amongst the pot plants that line his windowsill, and he made sure his bedsheets this week are bright and colourful.

He’s even put up a calender that shows different forests around the world that his grandfather shoved at him, and he likes looking closely at the pictures and picking out the small adaptations in the plants that he can see.

“Sorry,” he blurts out and Tanishi turns to look at him in confusion.

“Sorry what?”

… He doesn’t know. Sorry his room isn’t as exciting and nice as Tanishi’s? Sorry that his house is small and cold and unwelcoming and he doesn’t have warm tea and freshly made biscuits to offer him for afternoon tea?

Sorry that his family doesn’t have a lot of money…? 

Chinen looks down at his feet and scuffs his toes against the floor.

There’s a long pause before Tanishi breaks the silence. “Is this the English translation assignment due next week?” he asks, poking at the papers on Chinen’s desk.

Chinen nods and Tanishi makes a noise, grabbing them as he flops down on the floor where he proceeds to look through it. “And you’re nearly finished?! I didn’t understand it at all when we got it. You’re awesome, Hiroshi.”

That makes Chinen flush a bit in pleasure and he scuttles over to his desk to grab his notes from the assignment, sliding onto the floor as well with his dictionary to help Tanishi through it.

–

His first sleepover with a friend at his house goes well, Chinen thinks.

They have to be called to dinner when Chinen’s mother comes home, surprised out of their work together. He hadn’t even heard the usual scrunch of her tyres against the driveway as she pulls up and Tanishi carefully tucks away the pile of scribbled notes he’s put together for the assignment. Chinen explains translations a lot clearer than their English teacher, he says.

They eat the delicious meal that Tanishi’s mother cooked for them all, spread out across their dining table. Chinen’s mother snatches away the last eggplant slice from Chinen’s plate and laughs at him as she eats it openly in front of him.

It had been an arrangement between their parents, they find out. Chinen’s mother had known she was going to be late home that night, so Tanishi’s mother had insisted on arranging dinner for them all instead.

“You’ll have to come back again Tanishi-kun and I’ll make sure to cook for you then,” she promises and Tanishi agrees readily as he eats the special jelly based dessert Chinen’s mother had picked up on the way home.

He manages to get roped into an hour long game of cards against his grandfather and he finds out that Tanishi is an even worse cheat than his grandfather at the game.

They eat orange slices together and talk all night long, flicking off the light as they hear footsteps approaching Chinen’s shut door, though somehow he thinks his family doesn’t mind too much.

Chinen’s grandfather takes a shine to Tanishi during the morning training session, even though the other boy ends up sprawled heavily on his back more than once.

“Straighten your back, Hiroshi,” he grandfather snaps at him, the old man’s way of a compliment.

The glow of the sleepover with Tanishi hangs around with Chinen for the next week, to the point where even his mother comments on it as they hang out late into the night listening to the sounds of an evening shower on the roof.

He can’t help it though, even though he knows people are staring at him more as he grins as he comes to school in the morning.

Tanishi thinks his house is _cool_ and wants to come over again. Even being beaten by his grandfather wasn’t enough to deter the other boy and Chinen bounces with energy even during training sessions with his grandfather now.

It’s nice having a friend, he decides.

\--

Chinen hums to himself a little as he fixes up the garden near the tennis courts. With winter nearly setting in, he can’t do much about the garden besides get it ready for when spring arrives. So he focuses on fixing some of the drainage problems in the bed, a task that’s been taking a few afternoons.

He even stopped by the small cupboard that the gardening club has for all their tools to pick out a few things to borrow for the next few afternoons.

He wants to plant some strawberries soon too, and maybe start germinating a few seeds at home for later and Chinen starts making a mental list of things he has to do.

Chinen’s elbow deep in the dirt when he hears unfamiliar voices approaching, something that makes him stop. He knows all the voices of the tennis club by now, and even has names for most of them. And they’re the only ones that come by at this time.

Nasal-voickun is his least favourite, but there’s also Laughs-And-Then-Wheezes-kun and Breathes-Heavily-After-Practice-kun. He doesn’t know what they look like though, and he doesn’t care enough to look around at them, either. From the small conversations he picks up on, they don’t seem very interesting or good at tennis.

These voices though, aren’t from the tennis club.

“Hey, you! Those are our club things, why are you using them?” They’re voices not from the tennis club and talking to him apparently.

“What?” He looks up at them and then down to his garden.

“And that’s our garden bed. You’re not in our club, get away from there.”

Any sort of reply tangles up in his throat and dies and Chinen just stares at them, trying to think of something to say, his fingers scrunching up in the dirt.

He knows that he hasn’t been going to the gardening club meetings – he’s seen flyers of them littered around the school – but he knows he signed up for the club in the first week and has been faithfully doing his duties for the club every day.

Maybe these club members joined after him and don’t know him? Maybe? His eyes flick to the third year badge on their uniforms though and he tries to ignore how they look vaguely familiar.

Maybe he can just go back to what he was doing and they’ll go away. That seems like an idea. Chinen turns away and starts digging in the dirt again, though his hands shake a bit when he grips the trowel and he’s so aware of the pressure in the air around him.

“Oi, don’t ignore me--”

“No wait, I remember now. This is the weird first year you gave the shit garden to so we didn’t have to look at him.”

Chinen freezes and exhales shakily. 

It’s not a shit garden, he mouths to himself and he feels tender roots beneath his fingers break as he clenches his fingers together. It’s really good soil and things are growing and the tennis club behind him are really nice… and he’s not weird, he just...

“Hey Chinen-kun, what’s going on?”

It’s Hirakoba’s voice now and Chinen stares hard at the dirt. He suddenly doesn’t want Hirakoba to be there, even though he knew he was on the tennis court just a moment ago.

“You’re pretty shit senpai if you don’t know your own club members,” Hirakoba says and Chinen shuts his eyes to stop himself from seeing the expression that he knows is going to be on Hirakoba’s face.

Chinen doesn’t want to hear the conversation that goes on, makes himself recite the alphabet in English, numbers 1-100 in English and then backwards again to block it out. It’s harder to block out the angry voices though and Chinen finally stands up.

“Go away,” he says.

He belatedly realises his gardening club senpai are already leaving, before he could even speak and instead he’s talking to Hirakoba and Kite.

“Go away, you’re being bothersome. And short,” he says, the words tumbling over one another, and he clenches his fists by his side and tries not to notice how they’re shaking.

Chinen doesn’t know how to interpret Hirakoba’s expression – surprise, hurt, anger? - but he readies himself for _something_ as he sees Hirakoba’s mouth open to reply. Which is cut short by Kite stepping forward, his arm pushing Hirakoba back just slightly.

“I believe you’re the one being bothersome here, Chinen-kun. You’ve regularly interrupted our tennis club practices.”

Chinen feels himself deflate and he looks between Kite, Hirakoba and his garden. There’s noticeable silence behind them as well and Chinen clenches and unclenches his fingers, twisting them in the hem of his shirt. He tries to think of something to say, but all his words have gotten mixed up around his throat and he just mouths silently to himself.

Kite’s eyebrow just rises a little more and there’s a cool glint to his glasses as the boy tilts his head back slightly to look at him better.

Chinen shuffles his feet and then takes a deep breath. “You’re more bothersome. And stupid.” His voices shakes a little and he has to silently mouth the next part a couple of times in the stretching silence before he can spit the words out properly. “Go away, stupid Glasses-kun.”

He grits his teeth together and abruptly turns away so he can hurry away. 

If he runs faster and gets away from them, he doesn’t have to hear them laughing at him like they probably are, he tells himself and hunches his shoulders.

–

Chinen avoids the tennis club and his garden near it. Even though he knows he left tools there and the dirt is everywhere, he can’t bring himself to head back.

He spots Glasses-kun in the hallway and turns around and walks in the other direction, hunching his shoulders and wishes for once that he was shorter so he didn’t stick out so much.

Just the memory of it is enough to make Chinen flush and clench his hands together to stop them from shaking. Even worse is when Tanishi notices Chinen’s been heading home earlier, running into him on the way out the gate.

“You’re not gardening today, Hiroshi?”

Chinen shakes his head and they stop together at a nearby cafe where Tanishi treats him to a warm drink. It’s nice to wrap his hands around the cup and hunch in the seat. He can see other people from their school walking past, but Tanishi doesn’t seem to care.

Tanishi doesn’t think Chinen is a bother.

Maybe that’s what makes Chinen tell Tanishi what happened, though he stares at the swirl of cream on top of his drink more than he does at Tanishi as he talks.

“Glasses-kun said I was bothersome and interrupted practice,” he mumbles and Tanishi frowns at him. “And my gardening club senpai didn’t know I was in their club.”

Chinen grips his cup tighter and his eyebrows draw together. It hurts to repeat out loud, even worse is when he sees them out and about after school in their more prominent gardens that aren’t hidden around the side where no one goes. “That garden isn’t bad, it’s got really good soil and is growing better than some of theirs.”

Chinen knows, he’s checked in the past few days and clucked over some of the wilting plants in the other beds. He’s mumbling now, talking about the bad variety in plants and how one of the third year garden beds is going to be strangled over the holidays by fast growing invasive species if he’s not careful.

There’s a long silence as Chinen mumbles himself to speechlessness and Tanishi suddenly sighs, putting down his drink with a loud _clunk_. “Kite Eishirou sucks and has rubbish taste in cool people.

He just makes a non-committal noise. He doesn’t think Hirakoba is that bad and Hat-kun, while twitchy, isn’t that bad either. Chinen definitely doesn’t like Kite though, who thinks he’s bothersome.

Chinen hunches down on the seat a little more and stares at the top of his drink.

“Want me to beat him up for you?”

That makes Chinen look up in surprise and Tanishi’s grinning at him. He can’t tell if Tanishi is being serious or not, but he shakes his head anyway, just in case.

He doesn’t mind that much, if Kite thinks he’s bothersome, he decides. Especially when he’s the one sitting here with Tanishi who’s just offered to beat someone up for him and thinks he’s cool.

Chinen thinks Kite is bothersome and stupid and short, anyway.


	7. Chapter 7

Despite what he tells himself about the incident with Kite – that it doesn’t matter that Glasses-kun thinks he’s bothersome, because _Tanishi_ doesn’t think he is – it bothers him late at night as he lies in bed and stares at the ceiling.

He doesn’t like being called _bothersome_ , he decides. Especially when he knows he’s always had some trouble fitting in and… he’s tried very hard this year to _not_ bother people.

Chinen doesn’t think people notice though how he checks the plants around the school, just in case, even though he knows they’re the property of his gardening-club-senpai – the ones who didn’t know he exists, he reminds himself – or how he always makes sure to clean extra diligently when it’s his turn to clean the classroom.

He always tries to help out at physical education, although perhaps the fact that he spends more time lurking on the sides with Tanishi now makes him bothersome… Chinen frowns and adjusts the blankets around him at that thought. Maybe that’s okay to be selfish over, as long as he helps put equipment away and set it out.

The teachers don’t mind, anyway.

But still, no one has thought of him as _bothersome_ before, really.

Chinen sighs to himself and rolls over to his side. He can hear his grandfather sigh in the next room, almost in response to him, though he’s sure the older man is just falling asleep.

“Kite Eishirou is the one who’s bothersome,” he tells himself. “He sucks and has bad taste in friends.” Or at least that was what Tanishi told him. He repeats it again, as though that will make it more true.

It doesn’t really help that much though and Chinen sighs again as he rolls onto his other side, pulling his blankets up over his head and tucking his feet in.

–-

Chinen hears a lot of gossip in his classroom. Not because he openly seeks it out, but people seem to think that he can’t hear them, or don’t notice him sitting there when he stares out the window from his desk.

When he looks over at them, they always fall silent, but as he sits and watches the trees outside the window, or looks at his textbooks on his desk without moving the pages, they talk loudly enough for him to hear everything.

He knows that ‘Komori-chan’ has a boyfriend in third year and that they’ve been seen kissing behind the gym. Chinen wonders when, since it’s most definitely not during lunch time when he’s sitting there with Tanishi. It makes him laugh a little at the thought though, of scaring away a couple when they go there for lunch.

‘Sume-kun’ in second year apparently is ‘very well built’ and Chinen ponders what they mean by that, tilting his head slightly. The girls giggle when they say that and quickly shush each other. Perhaps Sume-kun is very tall. He wonders if he would be considered ‘well built’ as well then, if that’s the case.

‘Hitomi-chan’ who sits at the front of their class had a falling out with her friends the other day, supposedly. Something about being seen at Lotteria with some other girl’s boyfriend. 

Hirakoba comes up a couple of times in the ongoing gossip, but Chinen for some reason always looks over whenever he hears the name and the talk is always cut off very quickly. He wonders what they were going to say, every time.

Maybe he should ask Hirakoba about it.

Tanishi comes up as a topic of their gossip one morning and Chinen clenches his fingers in the material of his trousers to stop himself from looking over.

Tanishi Kei, ‘the big guy in the other class’ got suspended for fighting.

Chinen stands up abruptly and the sound of his chair scraping backwards makes them fall silent. It’s still a few minutes until homeroom is meant to start, but Tanishi’s classroom is just down the corridor.

They don’t normally go to each other’s classrooms, more happy to meet up at their lunch spot every day in an unspoken agreement. But Chinen knows that he sits in the back, in one of the middle seats. Apparently Tanishi had also been made to move to the back row early in the school year, but like him, Tanishi doesn’t seem to mind too much either. It gives him a good view, and he can eat snacks behind his books without the teacher noticing.

He pokes his head into the room and frowns as he scans it, ignoring the confused looks he gets from the classmates.

No sign of him at all.

Chinen plucks at the skin between his fingers and scrunches his toes in his indoor shoes. Maybe Tanishi is just in the bathroom, or late to school or something. He considers going to the shoe lockers to check if his outdoor shoes are there, but he can see the teachers already approaching for homeroom.

Lunchtime, Chinen promises himself.

He’ll wait for Tanishi at lunchtime and get the truth.

That thought alone makes Chinen leave his book in the classroom and he scuffs his feet as he waits at the garden bed where they normally eat lunch. Sometimes Tanishi arrives earlier than him, and Chinen made sure to linger a little in the classroom today after maths to ask the teacher a few questions, arriving a few minutes after the bell.

But there is no sign of the other boy, and no sign of him approaching him at all as Chinen waits.

He chews his lip and reluctantly opens his lunch box – leftover meatballs from last night with sauce that Chinen was particularly proud of. It’s spicy and well flavoured with herbs from his garden and Chinen sucks on the end of his chopsticks after every bite.

Maybe Tanishi really had been suspended. For how long though?

He’ll have to remember to bring his book for lunch tomorrow, Chinen tells himself. And maybe the next day too… the thought makes his stomach clench painfully and he prods at the carrot sliced in the shapes of flowers that his sister had made this morning.

Chinen looks up as he hears footsteps – definitely too light to be Tanishi’s though.

It’s Hirakoba and Hat coming around the corner and Hirakoba grins as he spots him.

“Ah, Chinen-kun, here you are. You weren’t in your classroom, so I thought you’d be here.”

Chinen looks between him and Hat, who is looking like he didn’t want to be there at all. He looks back to Hirakoba and then frowns. “How did you know I sit here?”

“Everyone knows this is where Tanishi-kun and you sit at lunch,” Hirakoba says, waving his hand as if it’s the most natural thing in the world. It’s strange, they really don’t get that many visitors around the side and Chinen’s pretty sure that the few that they have gotten, haven’t been any of his classmates.

“I didn’t know they sat here...” Kai says suddenly and Hirakoba elbows him sharply.

“Eishirou’s away today, so we thought we’d eat lunch with you.”

Somehow Chinen doesn’t believe Hirakoba all that much, at least about Kai who sits down on the other side of Hirakoba, perching on the garden bed wall. Hirakoba looks at ease though, as he pulls out his bento and Chinen can’t help but watch.

It’s a bento bought from an expensive store, he can see the price tag still on it and it makes Chinen grip his own leftovers a little closer to himself.

Probably more than they spend on groceries in a week, right there.

It’s certainly laid out much more carefully than Chinen’s one that he threw together this morning. Although, Hat’s bento has cute skewers in the food with dog faces and panda faces on them, even if the food isn’t too neatly put together. He wonders if Hat’s mother has a collection of them that she switches between.

Maybe he should get some too.

“Why is Glasse-- Kite away today?” Chinen asks, spearing a meatball with his chopsticks.

“He got suspended for fighting,” Hirakoba says and Chinen pauses. “I was impressed, I didn’t think Tanishi had the balls to take on Eishirou.”

“Oh.”

“He still lost, of course, but I think Eishiou’s going to have a nasty bruise on his face for a while.” Chinen doesn’t know if the obvious glee in Hirakoba’s voice is from Tanishi losing or Kite being punched in the face.

“It’s been a while since we’ve seen that,” Hirakoba adds on. It’s definitely because of Kite being punched in the face, Chinen decides and he frowns a little, shuffling a bit away from Hirakoba. It’s been a while since he’s been punched in the face by anyone and he doesn’t want Hirakoba to suddenly get ideas. “I think the last time was from you a few years ago, right Yuujirou?”

Kai flushes – Kai Yuujirou, Chinen repeats to himself. Kai Yuujirou. 

“That was an accident--”

Kai cuts off and looks at him and it’s only then that Chinen realises he’s been repeating the boy’s name out loud. It makes him fidget a little and he says the name one more time before turning back to his lunch, sucking on his chopsticks after the last meatball.

It’s strange, sitting and having lunch with Hirakoba and Kai Yuujirou, Chinen decides. Hirakoba fills the silence with his chatter – he talks even more than the gossipy people in his class – and Kai joins in soon enough.

It makes Chinen feel oddly isolated as they talk next to each other, their voices melding together as if this is normal. It’s hard to follow the conversation, about people and places he doesn’t really know. Occasionally Hirakoba asks him a question and Chinen just grunts in agreement to whatever. It seems to please Hirakoba though, who continues to chatter away happily enough after that.

He puts the lid on his lunch box and decides he is going to bring his book to lunch tomorrow.

–

It’s a relief when Chinen rounds the corner to the lunch spot and sees Tanishi sitting there just a few days later.

The boy’s face is bruised and the bandaid near his mouth is already spotted with blood as he talks and splits open a cut lip. Still, he seems happy enough and Chinen feels like his heart is blocking his throat or something with how hard it is to speak.

That’s illogical, he knows that from biology, but he doesn’t dwell too much on it.

“Thanks for calling me everyday,” Tanishi says and Chinen perches on the edge of the garden bed.

He puts his lunch box on top of the book he’d brought along just in case. Though he knew Tanishi was coming back today, it was… just in case.

“You missed a lot of school,” Chinen says. Three days. He’d counted all of them.

Tanishi snorts in laughter and is already starting to unpack his lunchbox. It’s more extravagant and larger than normal, but the only sign that Tanishi acknowledges it is that he piles more food than he normally does on top of Chinen’s serve of rice and beef mince.

“Kite’s missing more school than me,” he says with another laugh and Tanishi puts an entire sticky pork rib on top of Chinen’s lunch. “I think he got the whole week off, the Principal was furious.”

Tanishi had told him about the fight over the phone, but had been very reticent with details. Chinen can piece together some of the details though just by looking at him. His gaze lingers on the black eye and the mottled yellow and purple jaw and he wonders what Kite looks like. 

Tanishi’s better company than Hirakoba, Chinen decides. He doesn’t gossip about girls or teachers or going to parties. He just laughs freely and they sit and eat together, and there’s silence and no pressure for Chinen to add anything to the conversation.

“I heard you punched him in the face,” Chinen says finally. He hadn’t mentioned Hirakoba and Kai Yuujirou sitting with him at lunch time, he’d been too busy talking about what Tanishi had missed in schoolwork.

Tanishi laughs. “Yeah, I missed his glasses though, and his nose. He moved his head at the wrong time.”

Chinen laughs a little too, thinking about it. “You might have gotten glass in your hand. It would have been annoying.”

That makes Tanishi frown a little and he chews on the end of his chopsticks for a bit. “Maybe I’ll go for his gut next time, I might get a few more hits in that way.”

“Not at school though. You could get suspended again.”

_And leave me alone to have lunch with Hirakoba and Kai Yuujirou_ Chinen thinks and he bites his tongue to stop himself from saying it out loud.

He hadn’t minded the following lunchtime as much, he’d arrived and buried his head in his book and they’d never shown up. But they had the third day and even though he’d tried to block them out and focus on the words, it was hard.

Tanishi whacks Chinen on the back and laughs. He’s used to it now and he catches himself before he pitches forward, whacking Tanishi back. It makes the other boy wince, but the laughter doesn’t cut out. Still, Chinen notices and he tells himself he’ll have to avoid hitting that spot next time, there’s probably a large bruise under the school shirt.

“I’ll make sure to do it after school. I reckon if we worked together we’d win.”

–

He still can’t bring himself to go back to the tennis court garden though, even though he frets about it a little and the state he left it in.

It’s too… hard.

The garden near the gym doesn’t get as much sunlight and Chinen plucks at the dirt – also not as good – and his newly budding winter flowers look a little grim.

Even worse is that Kite Eishirou is back at school, looking sour with a green and yellow bruise covering one cheekbone, though the glint in his glasses is just as bad, if not worse now with the bruise.

Bothersome. Going back to the tennis courts would be bothersome, Chinen reminds himself when his footsteps almost lead him automatically back there one afternoon.

“Chinen-kun.”

Chinen pauses at the sound of his name and turns around, frowning as he sees Hirakoba and Glasses-kun standing together. They’re in their tennis gear, he notices and he twists his fingers in the bottom of his shirt.

“You haven’t been back to your garden lately,” Hirakoba says. “It’s been looking kind of wilted and ugly, I think you should fix it.”

Kite’s glasses flash and Chinen shuffles from foot to foot. Hirakoba sighs impatiently and prods Kite in the back before he starts walking towards the tennis courts. The ends of his hair is tucked into his collar and Chinen’s fingers twitch and he has to stop himself from fixing it.

“I’m going to training now. Eishirou wants to talk to you, I think he might be _apologising_ for what he said before.” The last part is combined with a rather pointed look at Kite that is ignored. “And go back and plant some flowers, I can’t play well if the garden isn’t aesthetically pleasing and it’s throwing me off.”

That doesn’t make any sense, Chinen decides and he goes to say as much, but Hirakoba disappears faster than Chinen can get his tongue to work around the words.

“Chinen-kun,” Kite says, cutting across his thoughts and Chinen turns around to look at him.

Short and bothersome and glasses are also bothersome, Chinen remind himself.

“Tanishi-kun informs me that you do karate,” Kite says, pushing up his glasses and Chinen glances at the bruise again. Kite’s knuckles are looking a little bruised as well and Chinen clenches his fingers together. “And that you’re better than he is, if he was telling the truth.”

Oh.

Chinen doesn’t know about that, he thinks Tanishi is very good at martial arts from the time that they’d sparred each other and with how well he’d put up with Chinen’s grandfather’s poking and prodding.

And Tanishi’s been in _tournaments_ , he reminds himself. And done very well in them too.

And besides, Chinen can’t be very good, he’d tripped up partway through simple katas just this morning and his kicks had been off lately, not being where they were meant to be.

“I’m not very good,” he says. “My grandfather beats me everyday.”

Does Kite want to beat up Chinen as well? He doesn’t think his family will be very happy if he comes back in the state that Tanishi was in now.

“My sister’s very good at karate though,” he blurts out and then pauses. “But you’re not allowed to hit her,” he hurries to add on.

Kite’s eyes narrow and Chinen thinks it makes him look rather hawkish. Chinen stares back and he holds his breath and makes his eyes widen a little more to keep staring. He doesn’t know where Kite is going with this, or why he really even cares.

“I’m recruiting people for the tennis club, who have experience with martial arts,” Kite says finally. “If you’re any good, you should consider it.”

Oh.

Kite had approached Tanishi with the same offer, hadn’t he? What had been Tanishi’s response…?

“I’m not interested in your club…?” Chinen says, repeating Tanishi’s words and he frowns a little. That didn’t seem right. “I’m not interested in your stupid club.”

That was right.

“I’m not interested in your _stupid_ club.” With the emphasis it sounded even better.

And, oh, Kite was still there. Staring at him.

Chinen clenches his fingers in his shirt and he scuffs his feet on the ground. “Sorry, Glasses-kun,” he says and he hurries away. He can feel Kite staring after him and it’s a relief to duck around a corner to get away from it.

–

The rest of the semester rolls by smoothly. He has another few sleepovers with Tanishi, continues doing well at school, though only with a fair amount of help on Geography from Tanishi, and they switch to the winter uniforms.

He doesn’t like the jacket, he decides. It’s too loose in the arms and too broad in the shoulders, but his mother promises him that he’ll grow into it. Chinen plucks at the excess fabric and he doesn’t know if he believes her. It’s also too baggy on the body, but so is his shirt, whose sleeves are still just a little short in the wrist.

It’s not as bad as Tanishi’s though, whose jacket pulls at the buttons when he does it up, and the shirt is much too long to cater for the boy’s broad chest and shoulders.

At least the uniforms are warm enough. Sitting near the window is nice enough in summer, but there’s definitely a draughtiness now as he sits next to it.

Still, they keep sitting outside at lunch time, moving to sit on the ground instead of on the garden bed wall so they can sit in the sunlight.

“So what do your family do for Christmas?” Tanishi asks him, pulling apart a chicken drumstick. The skin is crispy and Chinen clutches his own as he thinks.

“Nothing much. We sometimes go to Naha to see the Christmas lights, and my mum always goes to get cake on Christmas Eve when she’s finished with work.”

They have to preorder it weeks in advance though, and it’s always a bit of a scuffle between his sisters to choose what one they want. Chinen doesn’t mind what they pick, it’s always soft and delicious and he always eats too much.

Tanishi is silent for a while, eating one, two drumsticks and Chinen peels the skin off his own to eat.

“Do you want to spend Christmas eve at my place?” Tanishi asks finally and Chinen nearly drops the piece of meat he’d just bitten off. “Or maybe the 23rd, we could go there straight after school ends! My parents do really good fried chicken!”

His class is planning a Christmas party, he knows this. He’s heard them talk about it during home room while Chinen sits and reads his book. None of them had asked him about attending and Chinen had stared at the signup sheet to attend a few too many times in the past few days.

Not that it matters, it sounded loud and annoying to do karaoke with the rest of his class.

And he’s glad now, spending time with Tanishi seems like much more fun.

“I’ll have to ask my mum,” is always his response, and Tanishi knows it whenever they plan something. But they also both know that Chinen’s mum is always happy for their plans and has never said no. “Maybe the 23rd though.”

It gives him a bit of a buzz as he thinks about having to bring an overnight bag to school again – or maybe he can change his bus route slightly and drop it off in the _morning_ at Tanishi’s house…

Chinen feels silly as he grins and Tanishi laughs as he shoves a chicken wing into Chinen’s mouth.

–

It’s strange, when he stops to think about it.

He’s always found school ‘good’: he’s always liked learning and the challenge of the classroom. But the concept of making a _friend_ has made his first year at school so much better and Chinen sometimes ponders late at night why he’s never made one before.

He thinks he understands it now, why people congregate in groups at school. Or at least partly understands it.

Maybe now he also understands why people have Christmas parties with friends. Spending time with Tanishi’s family had been so much fun, even moreso when they shoved a present at him to open and it had been a bright purple hawaiian shirt.

He never wants to take it off, he decides, though it’s a little cool to be wearing it right now. Maybe during spring, when the flowers on it will match better.

He doesn’t feel ever like he’s intruding on them, particularly when Tanishi’s sister is off with friend’s and Tanishi’s brother ruffles his hair before he heads off on his Christmas date – an annual event, they tell him.

Tanishi’s present to him is a nice book on gardening and Chinen notes the little sticky tabs on plants when he flicks through it. Chinen gives him a plant that he promises can just sit on the windowsill and get watered occasionally.

Tanishi looks a little doubtful at that, but Chinen thinks he can manage to keep it alive.

His grades on the end of term exams are good and he grins at the 99% on his Science test. It’s the highest in the class and he’s pretty sure the highest in the year, but there’s some red marks on his other subjects that Chinen tries not to look at as he endeavours to do better.

Things only improve in the final term of school.

True, Tanishi’s in a different PE class now, so sitting on the sidelines and watching isn’t as fun, but Chinen doesn’t mind too much. He sees the other boy at lunch time every day still, and now that he doesn’t go to the garden at the tennis courts anymore… they tend to head to Tanishi’s place after school regularly too.

His mother gives him a little pocket money too, so they can occasionally stop of at a cafe on the way and stare and laugh at people walking by.

They build simple machines in Science and Chinen thinks about levers and fulcrums as he gardens, mumbling to himself late at night.

His mother gets a promotion at work, which sees her coming home a little earlier every night, but she has to go away a few more times a year. Chinen doesn’t mind it too much though, she’s home in time to cook dinner with them more often now and she shoos him out of the kitchen so she can throw together some of her ‘special meals’.

He always tries to figure out the ingredients, but she just smiles when he guesses.

And all too soon, first year is over and they’re at the closing ceremony, once agains sitting in alphabetical order. Tanishi’s sitting next to him still, except this time the melon pan is split in two and they share it, the sticky bread sitting heavily in his stomach, but it’s still delicious.

They’re still the tallest boys in the year, and even taller than most of the third years who are graduating. He wonders if there will be any tall people in first year next year.

“I’ll see you at the opening ceremony for second year,” Tanishi tells him with a grin. “I’ll bring two melon pan then,” he adds on and they laugh at the joke together.

Tanishi has to linger to wait with his older brother, but Chinen’s mother is picking him up from school today, getting out early from work just for the occasion.

He waits at the gate and works leftover melon pan out of his back teeth, clutching his bag in his arms.

“Bye, Chinen-kun. Have a good break.” There’s a light slap to his arm and Chinen turns to see Hirakoba hurry past him, a girl with him. “Make sure to return to your garden next year, okay? My tennis skills are counting on it!”

His answer gets tangled up in his mouth but he manages to wave. Though he doesn’t know if Hirakoba sees him as he slides into the backseat of a car that pulls up and Chinen sees a brief flash of a squashy leather interior before the door shuts.

\--

“Did you enjoy your first year at Higa Chuu, Hiroshi?” his mother asks him as she drives him home and Chinen fiddles with the air-conditioning vents and the little storage sections on the centre console. 

She knows the answer, he knows that. She regularly asks him similar questions whenever they spend quiet nights together around the dinner table, long after his siblings have gone to bed and she comes home late from work.

It’s not a lie when he nods and she smiles, settling back in her seat to drive.

If this is what junior high school’s like, Chinen rather likes it, he decides. Even if the gardening club isn’t as good as he thought when he’d applied to the school. And even if there’s annoying, bothersome short people with glasses. And even if Tanishi’s not in the same class as him, it’s not too bad.

He’s looking forward to second year.


	8. Chapter 8

Break goes by in the blink of an eye and before long, Chinen’s fretting about what to pack for school the next day and how he still has to finish weeding the back corner of his garden. The onset of Spring has made his garden grow with even more vigour than before and he’d spent most of the short break out in it.

His pencil case, Chinen tucks away in his bag and he makes sure to carefully count notebooks to ensure he has enough.

He goes to Tanishi’s place for one night over the break and his eyes still sting at the memory of staying up for most of the night, quietly playing video games in the living room until Tanishi’s mother came down to prepare breakfast for everyone and chased them to bed.

It had just been so hard to stop talking and joking about things they had planned for second year.

Topping the year in Science. Again. His mother had been so thrilled when she’d been told, Chinen thinks she might have cracked a rib from hugging him so hard.

Getting more growth spurts, although Tanishi does point out that they’re likely going to remain the tallest boys in their grade and by the time they’re third years, they’ll definitely be the tallest in the school.

They talked about joining a club, but they’d really come to enjoy the afternoons spent together. The ‘Going Home’ club was good enough, right?

Not fail Geography.

Tanishi wants to lose a bit of weight and he mulls over maybe cutting back portion sizes. But the words fade away the next morning as Tanishi’s mother places a huge traditional breakfast in front of them. Even Chinen’s stomach hurts at the end of it, but he accepts another serving of rice anyway to finish the dishes off.

Maybe make more friends, though he doesn’t voice that one aloud.

Go back to his other garden – the ownerless garden by the tennis courts, he corrects himself – and fix it up.

Chinen’s mother had wanted to drop him off at school that morning but she’d been called away for an emergency meeting. He knows she’s very apologetic about it though, and he heard her at 4AM that morning in the kitchen putting together lunches as he lay in the dark of his room and listened.

Chinen’s grandfather is on the job of taking his siblings to school and Chinen waves at the old man as he hurries out the door and heads for his bus.

He’s still sitting next to Tanishi in the opening ceremony and Chinen grins as the other boy slides into the seat next to him. He thinks maybe Tanishi has grown, but it seems silly to think since they only saw each other a few days ago.

“Hey Hiroshi,” Tanishi says, shifting a little on his seat. He’s definitely grown since the last year’s ceremony at least, wider and taller. Chinen doesn’t think the seats look all that comfortable now and he glances at the girl next to Tanishi who’s already been elbowed a few times.

“Hi Kei-kun.”

The name rolls off his tongue so easily now and it makes him smile as he says it again.

But they don’t have much more time to talk as the Principal steps up to welcome them and Chinen settles back into his chair. Tanishi elbows him and passes over half a melon pan, and Chinen stares at the person next to him when he eats, making them look away quickly.

“See you at lunch time,” Tanishi says as they move to head to their new classes. “At the normal spot?”

He’s never really liked opening ceremonies that much, but maybe he likes this one.

–

Chinen is relegated to a back row seat in the arranged seating plan by their teacher, almost the exact same seat that he’d had last year. It’s kind of comforting, even though the view out the window is a little higher up and in a slightly different direction. He can still see the frangipani tree though and hints of the ocean if he squints, and that’s good enough.

He doesn’t know people in the class though. There’s some people that had been with him last year, but Chinen can’t recall any of their names. It’s not like Shirt Always Untucked who used to always eat a yakisoba pan everyday, or Hair In A Ponytail With Ribbon who had worn a different ribbon every day for seven weeks.

Hat-kun is in his class this year though, and sits at the front, shuffling his feet under his desk as their maths teacher starts to talk. He looks different without a hat on and Chinen frowns as he tries to think of his name.

He’s very popular, Chinen starts to realise, even moreso than the people he thought had lots of friends in his old class.

Everyone likes to talk to Hat-kun, who, unless the teacher is in front of them, doesn’t seem to sit in his desk very often. Instead he hangs around other desks and talks, or just stands near the window and people come to him.

Chinen wonders what it’s like to be like that.

He doesn’t mind too much though, since he always goes to have lunch with Tanishi as normal, and the idea of it being _their spot_ is even more cemented now. They have to scare a couple of first years away the first day, but after that, it’s blissful silence as they stretch their legs into the patch of sun.

Otherwise, the people in his class leave him alone. They don’t do much group work in their classes and they’ve just been splitting into two halves of the class for PE. So he’s happy just sitting by his window and ignoring those around him. They don’t pay him any mind either.

He’s been looking forward to Science class since he spoke to Tanishi’s older brother about it in the break.

Second year Science apparently has _heart dissections_ and building electronic circuits with soldering irons. Chinen’s fingers drum against the desk as he watches the clock tick over to the next period in maths class. He’s finished all of his exercises, rearranging for x and he’s doodled a few plants in the corner. His love hearts are also getting more symmetrical, though he thinks it’s still stupid that they’re not even the proper shape.

Maybe he’ll start working on that next time.

Chinen hurries to the science labs and puts his books on a table - closest to the front, for once.

“Everyone needs to get into a pair,” the teacher calls and there’s an immediate rush for people to pair up. His words make Chinen freeze though and he moves just a bit closer to his chosen table.

Last year they’d just been assigned groups. He knows they hadn’t been happy to be put in a group with him last year, but their attitudes had changed over the course of the year and he’d kept topping all of the tests.

Chinen looks around the classroom - none of his old group members were in his class this year and he plucks at the skin between his fingers.

The noise dies down and he’s still standing there.

“Chinen-kun, you need to find a group,” his teacher says and Chinen just stares mutely at him. 

He’s taller than the teacher, already, definitely the tallest boy in the class by a significant margin. Sometimes he wishes he was shorter, particularly now because he stands out as he stands alone and he twists the fabric of his pants in his fingers.

I can work alone, he wants to say. I can do all my experiments by myself, it doesn’t bother me. He won’t be a bother to the people around him, or to his partner... 

But the words get stuck in his throat and he can’t quite spit them out. It’s frustrating and his face screws up and he shakes his head and shuffles his feet.

“I can work with Chinen!”

Chinen looks up in surprise, to see Hat-kun with his hand thrust in the air, staring at the teacher just as hard as Chinen himself had been.

It’s hard to hear what’s going on in the classroom - definitely muttering though - as Hat picks up his stuff and trots over to Chinen’s claimed desk. He looks strange without his hat, almost with a too small head and Chinen stares at him as he tries to figure it out.

They sit in silence as the teacher explains their activity today - testing the pH of common household chemicals - and the concept of acids and bases. Chinen knows all of this already, he has a soil testing kit for the pH of gardens that he likes to use.

So instead he stares at Hat and tries to figure out his name. He knows it, he learned it last year… He knows he’s not good at names and has to practise them to remember them - he’s only just getting his head around all of Tanishi’s siblings.

It’s just easier to think about people in regard to details about them, rather than their names.

“Kai Yuujirou,” he blurts out and Hat turns to stare at him.

“Yeah?”

Oh good, he’d remembered the name correctly.

Chinen smiles and settles back in his seat, turning his attention to the teacher finally. The man is now talking about the universal indicator they’re using and Chinen pulls the colour chart towards him.

Kai’s still staring at him in confusion.

It’s easier to talk when he’s doing experiments and telling Kai what to do. “Put the vinegar in here, add three drops, what colour is it”.... those sorts of words roll off his tongue so easily without him having to practise them beforehand.

He kind of wishes everything else was that easy.

Kai’s a good partner though, Chinen decides, even if he nearly trips over his feet as he goes to get the samples they have to test.

“What does the red mean?” Kai asks, as he stares at the test tube and gives it a bit of a shake.

Chinen gets the pH chart and starts talking about hydrogen and acidity and colour changes and things that he read late at night in a textbook and his words trail off suddenly as he realises Kai is staring at him.

“..... Kai Yuujirou,” he says suddenly and they stare at each other for a while longer before Chinen turns away to awkward shuffle the bottles on the desk around.

It’s strange to head back to the classroom after Science with Kai trailing him and talking. “Wow, you’re so good at Science! I had no idea about any of those questions and you just answered them so quickly!”

Chinen doesn’t know how to take his words and just nods a little as he goes to his desk to put his books away and get his lunch out. They left a little late since they had to clean up the Science lab, but he thinks Tanishi has PE anyway and will have to be getting changed, so it’s okay to be a little later to the lunch spot.

Kai’s still at his desk talking and Chinen looks up only when Kai stops, turning to look at the door.

Chinen follows his gaze and his grip tightens on his lunch box as he spots Glasses-kun, standing in the door way.

“Hey Eishirou! Did you know Chinen is _really good_ at Science? He’s my new lab partner, I think I might even manage to get a B this semester if I work with him. He explains things better than the teacher.” Kai’s voice carries through the classroom and Chinen shrinks a little into himself, even moreso as Glasses-kun walks into the classroom.

“Yes, everyone knows that. He topped Science last year.” Glasses looks at him and Chinen pointedly looks away, staring at the ceiling this time. “Lunch, Kai-kun, you forgot yours at home.” 

Chinen cuts across Kai before he can answer, shuffling away from his desk and clutching his lunch box tightly. “Bye Hat Yuujirou-kun,” he says before he flees the classroom. 

–

Tanishi looks grumpy when he reaches their lunch spot and Chinen is already partway through poking around in his lunch – mystery meat that looks suspiciously pink, in a brown sauce.

“Stupid Hirakoba kicked me out of my seat. Said he couldn’t see the ocean enough from his assigned seat before,” is Tanishi’s explanation and Chinen sucks the sauce off the end of his chopsticks thoughtfully.

“Why does that make a difference?”

They all moved desks, the people around him change every so often and it’s only Chinen who has a properly permanently assigned seat, if only because he’s so tall. He would have thought that Tanishi was in the same situation.

“Hirakoba’s grandmother is really annoying,” Tanishi says and he bites hard on his chopsticks, shovelling food into his mouth before he keeps talking. “He used to skip class a lot in elementary school until she made the teacher sit him near the window. Stupid Hirakoba still needs it, apparently.” Tanishi grumbles a bit more under his breath and Chinen hears words like ‘suck up’, ‘crybaby’ and ‘spoiled’.

Chinen doesn’t really know what to do besides awkwardly pat Tanishi on the arm and he fidgets awkwardly and goes back to poking at his lunch when Tanishi looks at him questioningly.

“Why is Hirakoba’s grandmother influential?” he wonders aloud. He thinks about his grandfather or possibly his mother trying to ask to school to sit him somewhere else and he doesn’t think anything would come out of it.

Maybe if his grandfather swept the Principal’s feet from under his and the man landed on his back like Chinen had this morning, it might do something. He knows what the movement looks like, and even though he can anticipate it now, his legs always end up getting tangled as he tries to avoid it and his grandfather always wins anyway.

Tanishi chews over his words a bit and finally blurts out, “His house is really big. It’s up around the corner from the school, up the hill. With really big walls.”

Chinen scrunches his eyebrows together and there’s so many questions that he wants to ask. Why does Tanishi know where Hirakoba lives – is that meant to be common knowledge? Why does having a big house make a difference?

“Sorry, my house is big too,” he says finally and he curls his toes in his shoes.

“Yeah, but yours is...” Tanishi trails off and looks much too hard at his lunch. Chinen looks at his friend and then down to the lunch as well – there’s nothing there that’s particularly stare worthy.

“Mine is…?”

Tanishi just thumps him on the back and Chinen catches himself before he pitches forward as always. “Your house is cool, Hiroshi. And your grandfather isn’t stuffy like Hirakoba’s grandmother.”

That makes him grin a bit, he’ll have to tell his grandfather that.

There’s silence for a moment and Chinen just laughs to himself as he thinks about how his grandfather will take the compliment. 

Tanishi finally speaks again, elbowing him to get his attention first. “Oh hey! Do you want to meet a friend of mine? He’s in first year, he could use some toughening up.”

–

Chinen finds himself looking at his house when he goes home that night and wanders through the normally unused rooms. 

He knows that his house is bigger than a lot of the others in the area, and it’s certainly much larger than Tanishi’s even though his family is smaller. Chinen doesn’t know how big Hirakoba’s house is, but… there’s a lot of unused room in his. 

There’s one that’s just got boxes tucked in the corner that he knows are his grandfather’s old military memories, and boxes of dusty trophies and certificates. Some of them are empty, that his mother just occasionally airs out and uses for visitors.

Sure, there’s part of the porch that had fallen apart these holidays and Chinen has already made plans to fix it with his grandfather next time he’s on break, and the paint is peeling badly in some places… fixing the gate had been on his grandfather’s to do list for the past many years… and the bathroom door gets stuck sometimes and has to be carefully levered closed.

And it’s old, but Chinen likes the age. Sometimes he lies in bed when it’s windy outside and listens to how the house creaks and groans and he can almost imagine it’s a ghost.

“My house is cool,” Chinen says to himself as he wanders back into his room, passing his grandfather’s room on the way. 

It kind of makes him want to see Hirakoba’s house though, to find out what makes his so uncool.

–

Chinen doesn’t know what to do the next day when he shows up to their usual lunch place and there’s someone else already standing there, looking uncomfortable.

He stares at them and they stare back, and Chinen moves to sit down on the edge of the garden bed as normal. Only, it feels weird to open his lunch box with them there and without Tanishi, so he settles for just watching them instead.

It’s a relief when he hears the heavy footsteps of Tanishi and Chinen perks up a little bit as the boy rounds the corner. “Oh! Taira, you’re already here. Hiroshi, this is my neighbour, Yamashiro Taira. He’s the first year I mentioned yesterday.”

Chinen hums as he looks at Yamashiro. He’s… Chinen supposes _pretty_ could be a word he could use. Certainly, the brown hair sticks out a bit in the school full of black hair and, Chinen peers a little closer; his eyes aren’t brown either.

“Your neighbour that Hirakoba dated and then dumped because he wasn’t pretty enough?” Chinen asks, glancing at Tanishi and then back to Yamashiro. “I think he’s pretty enough.”

Tanishi’s eyes widen in panic suddenly and he frantically waves his lunch box around. “No! No no! That’s another neighbour! A female neighbour!”

“… Oh.”

There’s a long silence and Tanishi coughs, before moving to sit next to Chinen. Yamashiro is watching him and Chinen recognises the general confusion in his expression. There’s no sign of the wary sideways stares that he gets from his classmates though and he settles down a bit. He doesn’t mind the confusion, he gets it often enough from people, even sometimes his own family members.

Things get a little easier when Yamashiro sits down as well. He’s not as noisy as Kai Yuujirou and Hirakoba, and he chats easily with Tanishi. Sometimes there’s names of people Chinen doesn’t know and he gropes around as he tries to figure things out.

Yamashiro’s father runs a post office, he learns that much. And he has a lot of older sisters, but the names all blend into one and Chinen can’t quite figure out how many there are. Tanishi seems to know them all though, and Chinen is determined to ask him for memorisation techniques later.

Yamashiro calls Tanishi by his given name with no -kun at the end, but Chinen has tried that in his head before and it’s weird. Kei-kun sounds much better.

“Do you do a martial art?” Chinen asks suddenly and Yamashiro perks up a little at the question.

“Yeah! I started karate just a bit before Kei did. I’m not as good as him though.”

“Don’t join the tennis club.” The words just slip out and Chinen sits up a little straighter as he realises before he laughs quietly to himself.

Tanishi snorts in laughter and leans over Chinen to slap Yamashiro on the back. “Yeah! Hiroshi’s right, don’t join the tennis club, they’re stupid.”

“Especially Glasses-kun,” Chinen adds on.

“Kite Eishirou,” Tanishi says and Yamashiro just nods. “And if he comes and talks to you about it, just tell him to go away.” Tanishi pauses for a moment before he laughs a bit. “Maybe you should also call him Glasses-kun, he’d hate that.”

There’s the same degree of enjoyment in his voice that Hirakoba had when he was talking about Kite being punched and Chinen wonders what it is that causes it.

Maybe he should try it to find out.

–

It’s a panicked Kai that comes to see him the next morning, practically dragging him in through the classroom door to sit down. Chinen just manages to avoid hitting the door frame and he wonders how Kai doesn’t rocket around the room from wall to wall sometimes.

“Chinen, you’re finally here! You’re really good at English, right? You always get the answers right when the teacher questions you.”

Chinen blinks in surprise as Kai shows him the homework from the other day, scribbled cross outs over the answer spaces and a few pictures doodled in the corners. He’d finished this particular homework they day they’d gotten it, he’d enjoyed changing the forms of verbs and the last ones had been particularly tricky.

“I didn’t finish it and I had a nightmare that I’m going to get called on next period about it,” Kai complains and he pushes a pen at Chinen. “Please please please, I’ll buy you some yakisoba pan at lunch.”

It’s a weird feeling, bending over the desk to fill in the spaces as the rest of the class is around them. He’s at the front of the classroom, he’s standing out, this is the first time he’s ever shared _homework_ with someone…. Chinen has to cross out one of his answers that he accidentally writes wrong but Kai doesn’t seem to notice, he’s practically vibrating with energy as he watches.

It’s not hard though and Kai looks like he’s about to cry as Chinen straightens up and hands back the pen.

Chinen doesn’t know how to respond to the spontaneous hug he gets, just standing there uncomfortably until Kai pulls away and waves his homework book above his head.

Kai does actually get called on during English class that morning and Chinen stares at the back of the boy’s head as he sits back down after answering correctly. He looks like any tension in him has just disappeared as he flops into his seat. Perhaps Kai’s psychic; there’s a character in the book he’s reading at the moment who can see into the future and uses it to solve crimes.

The bell rings for lunch time and Chinen sits uncomfortably in his seat while the rest of the class move. Kai had made him promise to wait for the bread and Chinen looks out the window. He knows he can’t see his lunch spot from there, but it doesn’t stop him from trying. He wonders how late he’ll be and how Tanishi will feel.

Kai runs out through the door, passing Kite Eishirou on the way.

“I’ll be back Eishirou, I just have to buy Chinen some bread!” And then Kai is gone, and Chinen can hear his apologies to people all along the hallway as he runs to the cafeteria.

Kite’s staring at him and Chinen tries not to notice as he gets closer. There’s a neatly wrapped lunch box placed on Kai’s desk and he looks at it instead – there’s dogs on the furoshiki and Chinen squints a little as he counts them.

“Why is Kai-kun buying you bread?” Glasses asks and Chinen starts a bit, looking up at him.

“I helped him with homework,” Chinen says and if he stares just past Kite’s ear, it’s easier to form words and not stumble over them. “I’m good at English,” he adds on helpfully.

Some of the other members of the class had also copied his answers after that and Chinen had felt a little thrill of rebellion at it all.

“Yes I know.” Kite narrows his eyes slightly.

There’s always awkwardness with Glasses-kun and Chinen fidgets a bit, looking out the window again, and then to his hands on his desk. Kite’s still staring at him, Chinen is all too aware of his gaze and how close Kite is standing.

“Did you know Kai Yuujirou is psychic?” Chinen blurts out and he can see Kite opening his mouth to reply, but he’s cut off by Kai himself running back into the room, waving a yakisoba pan above his head.

Chinen doesn’t like the way people stare at him when Kai throws the bread at his head and he fumbles his catch. But he leaves straight away anyway, so it doesn’t matter, really. And Tanishi seems happy enough when he splits it with his friend at lunch time.

He just laughs when Chinen tells him who it’s from. He wisely doesn’t say anything about Kite Glasses Eishirou though.

–

It feels weird, but also very familiar to head towards the tennis courts after school.

_Just do it_ , Chinen’s been telling himself and if he goes late enough, the tennis club will have already started practising and he won’t have to run into Kite.

He makes a mental checklist with each step there, about things he needs to do with the garden. It won’t take long, he says to himself. He’ll just tidy it up, collect the tools that he left there, take a few cuttings to take back home and plant, and then he can leave it.

Normally he wouldn’t bother about the cuttings, but there had been a few good plants starting to grow there that he’d like to save.

Tidy up, tools, cuttings, leave…

Chinen stops as he reaches the garden and stares at it. It’s… not at all how he left it.

There’s _flowers_ in there now, and all completely different, stupid flowers that he’d never have planted there because none of them compliment each other and there’s too much mint that’s going to choke them and already Chinen can see the bulbs that need to be cut away.

They were store bought plants that had been planted, not ones that were grown from scratch and they make his fingers itch.

They… gave his garden away.

“Oh! Chinen-kun, you’re here.”

It’s Hirakoba and Chinen glances at the boy and then back to his garden. He wants to rip out all the mint and maybe a few of the flowers. They’d gotten rid of his goya plant that he’d planted for no other reason besides having been told on the first day of school…

“I like what you’ve done with the garden bed. The flowers are really nice.”

Chinen clenches his hands into fists and he takes a deep breath. “It’s not mine.” It’s harder than anything else to spit those words out and he makes himself repeat it. “It’s not mine. It’s someone else’s.” He doesn’t like how miserable he sounds, even though it’s a good garden and the person in charge of it now isn’t a good gardener.

“Oh...” Hirakoba is quiet for a little while and Chinen stands there, listening to the thwack of the balls in the background. It’s been a while since he’s heard it and it’s almost soothing.

“I thought the flowers looked a little wilted. Yours would probably be much better.” Hirakoba’s voice is very different to how it normally is when they talk about gardening. Almost disdainful and his expression isn’t much better, Chinen decides.

“Maybe.” _Yes_ , probably, but Chinen doesn’t want to say that.

Tidy up – he doesn’t need to do that now, he supposes.

Nor does he need to get the tools he left behind, they’re long gone. Even the new water irrigation system he’d been fitting in is all gone.

And… they’re not his plants and he doesn’t want to grow them anyway. Even though he’d gone to the effort of making up the module tray to collect them in and he clutches it in his hand.

“Bye Hirakoba,” he says eventually and Hirakoba looks at him. He had been inspecting the plants, Chinen realises. Hirakoba who had wanted him to plant flowers, well, surely he was happier now that there were some here?

“I’ll...” stop being bothersome, Chinen thinks to himself, but he can’t bring himself to say it and his tongue gets caught in his mouth even when he tries.

Because he not bothersome. The person who took his garden is the one who’s bothersome. And a bad gardener. But probably noticed by the gardening club and on their member list.

But he can’t say that either and he takes a deep breath in before he awkwardly pats Hirakoba on the head and hurries away.


End file.
